Manufacture of Bagasse Activated Carbon Using H2SO4 Activator

Manufacture activated carbon bagasse waste has been prepared using H2SO4 catalyst in successful research. Bagasse is made from yellow bagasse. First, carbon C is obtained by drying carbon using an oven at temperature of 300°C for 2.5 hours. Active carbon of bagasse is obtained from activation of 5% H2SO4 (1M) in a ratio of 1:10. The measurements performed in this study were the water absorption test and activated carbon. When measuring the water content, Evaporated substance content, ash content, and bound activated carbon level were measured according to SNI 06-3730-1995. FTIR results showed a sharp and wide peak around 3387 cm−1, 2922.16 cm−1 which shows the vibration of the O-H group on inactivated bagasse carbon, but after activation there is a peak around 3410.15 cm−1. Comparison of the diffraction patterns of carbon before activation and carbon after activation shows that all solids have broad peaks in the 20° - 45° region which is a characteristic peak of carbon and there are also pointed peaks in the 23° and 43° regions. The XRD results showed broadened peaks and absence of pointed peaks, irregular background intensity and showed an amorphous structure.


Introduction
The agricultural sector has contributed greatly to human and economic development.Lack of awareness regarding the disposal of agricultural solid waste has a significant impact on the well-being of humans, animals, and the environment.The annual production of lignocellulosic biomass is a major environmental concern due to the high yields that can be used to convert agricultural waste into additional crops.This step can encourage the use of natural raw materials.[1] [2].One of the agricultural wastes that can be developed as activated carbon material is bagasse.[3].Activated carbon can be applied in various industrial fields such as gas storage, purification of air pollutants and fragrances, gas separation, catalysis for various cleaning procedures, metal extraction, water purification, chromatographic separation by ultrafiltration techniques, supercapacitors, electrodes used in medical diagnostics or drug discovery, and other applications [4].Activated carbon can be used in various applications and is no longer considered waste [5] [6].Bagasse is a raw material for sugar production that can only grow in tropical climates.Bagasse is the fibrous material that remains after bagasse is crushed and squeezed.Bagasse is the residue of sugarcane juice extraction and contains 35-50% cellulose, 25% hemicellulose (one of the components of protein C), and 22-25% lignin [7] [8].Cellulose and lignin make bagasse a potential carbon source that can be used for adsorption [9].Activated carbon can be delivered utilizing two strategies, the physical activation method and the chemical activation method [10].Physical activation is a heat treatment that involves carbonization through an activation process [11] [12].The purpose of this research focuses on the synthesis of activated carbon from bagasse because of its high lignocellulose content in bagasse by using H2SO4 as an activator substance through physical activation and chemical activation methods.

Materials
The main materials used in this study were bagasse was taken from yellow colored sugarcane and 250 ml of 5% H2SO4 with a concentration of 1 M.

Manufacture of activated carbon from bagasse
In this research, the bagasse used was taken from yellow colored sugarcane.The bagasse was washed in running water and dried in the sun.The dried bagasse was cut into pieces and then physically activated.The physical activation carried out is carbonized using a furnace at a temperature of 300℃ for 2.5 hours.Then the results of carbonization of bagasse are cooled in a desiccator.After cooling, the bagasse carbon was weighed.After physical activation, the cooled bagasse carbon was then chemically activated with H2SO4 solution.A total of 20 g of bagasse carbon was mixed with 250 ml of 5% (1M) H2SO4 solution in a ratio of 1:10.Furthermore, carbon powder is chemically activated with sulfuric acid solution (H2SO4).and deposited for 24 hours then drained.Furthermore, it was stirred for 2 hours using a Magnetic Stirrer and a hot plate with a speed of 230 rpm and a temperature of 80 o C. At that point the carbon was washed with refined water until the PH was neutral, at that point dried in an oven at 105 o C for 3 hours and after that cooled in a desiccator until it come to room temperature so that the bagasse activated carbon was obtained.

Characterization 2.3.1 Water Absorption Measurement
Water absorption capacity is the percentage of water mass that can be absorbed by activated carbon in water.Weighed the wet bagasse to produce a mass of 150 g and dried it in an oven at 35 o C and weighed the mass to obtain 88 g.The water absorption measurement was carried out by measuring the wet mass (mw) and dry mass (md) according to the ASTM C-20-00-2005 equation:

The rendeman of activated carbon
The Rendemen of activated carbon is the amount of activated carbon produced after the activation process, so it is expected that the rendemen value is high.The resulting rendemen value depends on the type and water content of the raw materials used.The rendeman of activated carbon can be measured through the dry weight and wet weight of bagasse activated carbon as in equation 2 below: ‫ݔ‬ 100%

water content
The determination of water content is purposed to determine the hygroscopic properties of bagasse (2) activated carbon.The procedure for determining water content refers to Indonesian National Standard (SNI) 06-3730-1995 on quality requirements and testing of activated carbon.For measure the moisture content of bagasse carbon, the equation can be used by equation 3.

The ash content
The determination of ash content purposes to determine the content of metal oxides in bagasse activated carbon.The ash content of bagasse in this research was conducted at the Integrated Laboratory, Universitas Sumatera Utara, Medan, Indonesia.The ash content testing process is based on the SNI 06-3730-1995 standard by equation 5.
The ash content (%) = With: a = weight of sample and petri dish before drying (g) b = weight of sample and petri dish after drying (g) c = weight of sample before drying (g)

Bound Carbon Content
To calculate the bound carbon content of bagasse carbon, the following equation can be used equation: % activated carbon content = 100% -(% volatile matter content+% ash content)

Water Absorption measurement
In this study, the samples were soaked in distilled water for 3 hours at room temperature and obtained a wet bagasse mass (mw) of 150 g and dried in an oven at 35 o C and weighed to obtain a dry mass (md) of 88 g.The water absorption test before activation with bagasse carbon was 41.33%.Water absorption test before activation with bagasse carbon was 41.33%.For testing the water absorption capacity after activation of bagasse carbon, weighed wet bagasse (mw) as much as 20 g and dried in an oven at 35 o C and obtained a dry mass (md) of 88 g.So obtained the water absorption capacity after activation of bagasse carbon.So that the obtained water absorption capacity after activation is 58%.This result shows that the percentage of water mass that can be absorbed by carbon activated bagasse with H2SO4 activator in water can still be said to be good at absorbing water.

The rendeman of activated carbon
The final weight of carbon (dry weight) was 12.6 g and starting weight of carbon (wet weight) was 20 g of the rendeman of activated carbon.So, the rendeman of activated carbon was 63%.This result states that the amount of bagasse activated carbon produced after the activation process with H2SO4 can be said to be high and good activated carbon for use.

Water content
For measure water content of bagasse carbon, obtained that starting weight was 1.047 g and final weight (3) was 0.988 g.So that the water content of activated carbon with H2SO4 activator was 5.9 %.The results of this study state that it meets the requirements of SNI 06-3730-1995 with a maximum value of 15%.

Evaporated substance level
At this research, starting weight was 1.047 g and final weight was 0.988 g, so that the result of evaporation substantially level was 5.6 %.From these results it can be said that the evaporated substance level for activated carbon of sugarcane bagasse activated by H2SO4 fulfils the requirements of SNI 06-0370-1995 with a maximum value of 25%.From the results of ash content, it can be said that the metal oxide content in activated carbon is in low quantities so that the ash content in this study meets the requirements of SNI No. 06-3730-1995 which is less than 10%.

Bound activated carbon level.
From the data analysis, it was found that the Evaporated substance level was 5.6%, and the ash level was 1.4%, so the Bound activated carbon level was 93%.
% Bound activated carbon level = 100% − (5,6% + 1,4%) % Bound activated carbon level = 93% The purity of activated carbon can be determined by the value of its bound actived carbon level, called its binding affinity.In this study, the value of bound carbon in bagasse can potentially be a good active carbon.
3.7 FTIR testing FTIR test results can be seen through the relationship of transmittance (%) and wave number (cm -1 ).In FTIR testing, the tests carried out were activated carbon bagasse before activation and activated carbon bagasse after activation which can be shown in Figure 1.The inactivated bagasse carbon sample shows a sharp and wide peak at 3387 cm -1 , 2922.16 cm -1 which shows the vibration of the O-H group, but after activation there is a peak at 3410.15 cm -1 due to the presence of H2SO4 which has reacted with carbon.In addition, the peak at wave number 1633.71 cm -1 on carbon before activation and 1616.35cm -1 on carbon after activation shows that the aromatic C=C functional group is decreasing.While the C-H alkane functional group is at wave number 2922.16 cm -1 on carbon after activation.In the carbon after activation of the wave number 1035.77cm -1 there is a C-N Amine functional group.This reinforces that activated carbon has been formed due to the formation of new pores.

X-Ray Diffraction testing
The results of XRD testing on bagasse before and after activation can be shown in Figure 2. Figure 2 shows that the diffraction pattern before activation is marked in black and the diffraction pattern after activation is marked in red.Both diffraction patterns are in a naturally decreased state.This decrease in crystallinity occurs due to the build-up of polymer chains which makes the interaction between the activated and inactivated bagasse suppress the crystallization process.Comparison of the diffraction patterns of carbon before activation and carbon after activation shows that all solids have broad peaks 2Ɵ in the 20 o -45 o region which are characteristic peaks of carbon and there are also pointed peaks in the 23 o and 43 o regions.The peaks 2Ɵ at 23 o and 43 o may be caused by the uneven mixture of bagasse with carbon so that there are still silica components that appear.But in general, the XRD results formed on bagasse before and after activation are amorphous atomic arrays.

Conclusion
From the results of the research that has been done both in physical and chemical activation methods with a carbonization temperature of 300oC for 2.5 hours, it can be concluded that activated carbon bagasse after activation with H2SO4 has a good quality of activated carbon used.From the physical activation analysis, namely in testing water absorption, rendemen activated carbon, water content, Evaporated substance level, ash content, and bound carbon content fulfill the requirements of SNI 06-0370-1995 standards.From chemical analysis, it can be seen in the results of the FTIR spectrophotometer showing the functional groups on carbon and bagasse activated carbon are O-H stretch vibrations, C-O stretch vibrations, C=C Alkene stretch vibrations, C-H Alkane stretch vibrations and C-N stretch vibrations.And the test results using XRD state that activated carbon bagasse that has been activated produces an amorphous form with a wide spectrum.

Figure 1 .
Figure 1.The results of FTIR of bagasse before activation and after activation Figure 1 shows the comparison of FTIR spectra of bagasse carbon before and after activation with H2SO4.The inactivated bagasse carbon sample shows a sharp and wide peak at 3387 cm -1 , 2922.16 cm -1 which shows the vibration of the O-H group, but after activation there is a peak at 3410.15 cm -1 due to the presence of H2SO4 which has reacted with carbon.In addition, the peak at wave number 1633.71 cm -1 on carbon before activation and 1616.35cm -1 on carbon after activation shows that the aromatic C=C functional group is decreasing.While the C-H alkane functional group is at wave number 2922.16 cm -1 on carbon after activation.In the carbon after activation of the wave number 1035.77cm -1 there is a C-N Amine functional group.This reinforces that activated carbon has been formed due to the formation of new pores.

Figure 2 .
Figure 2. The results of XRD of bagasse before activation and after activation 3.5 The ash content.Based on the results of the ash content test at the Integrated Laboratory of the Universitas Sumatera Utara No. 545/UN5.4.4.1/KPM/2023, the ash content contained in bagasse was 1.4% was shown at Table1.