Water Science & Technology: Water Supply Vol 12 No 4 pp 531–539 © IWA Publishing 2012 doi:10.2166/ws.2012.026

Assessment of alternate characterization tests for prediction of taste and odour control by granular activated carbon

Kyla Smith, Xiaodan Zhang and Ron Hofmann

The acetoxime number test was recently identified by the American Society for Testing and Materials as a method to characterize activated carbon. This adsorption isotherm gives information about the number of high energy adsorption sites on the surface of an activated carbon. A similar test uses tetrafluoromethane for the same purpose. In contrast, the more common iodine number and Brunauer, Emmet and Teller (BET) surface area parameters are a measure of the total number of adsorption sites. 2-Methylisoborneol (MIB) is reported to require high energy sites for removal, so it was hypothesized that data from acetoxime and tetrafluoromethane isotherm tests for different activated carbons would be better correlated to MIB removal than iodine numbers or BET surface areas. MIB breakthrough was monitored in rapid small-scale column tests (RSSCTs) using four natural waters and five activated carbons. Results showed no correlation between acetoxime or tetrafluoromethane isotherms and MIB breakthrough.

Keywords: geosmin; granular activated carbon; 2-methylisoborneol; taste and odour; trace capacity number

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