The nitrogen crisis is one of the biggest problems in society. Therefore, a tremendous amount of research is going on to solve this problem. This thesis focuses on solving the problem of nitrogenous emissions by capturing ammonium emissions from agricultural farms. Biochars have been gaining much attention due to their desirable properties, such as large specific surface area, a robust pore structure, and the presence of rich functional groups like carboxylic, phenolic, hydroxyl, hydroxylic, and metals. All these properties help biochar
in adsorbing nitrogenous products. Biochars can also serve as good soil conditioners when returned to the soil. The application of biochar to the ground could also increase soil fertility. Research has shown promising results
in applying biochar for ammonium capture at a lower price. Ammonium adsorption experiments were carried out to quantify the amount of ammonium adsorbed on biochars. Further, various experiments were carried
out to characterize the biochar for ammonium adsorption, such as X-ray diffraction (XRD), X-ray fluorescence (XRF), Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET) surface analysis, FTIR (Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy). In addition, the adsorption mechanism was determined by analyzing the physico-chemical properties of pine wood pellet biochar and its UV activated biochar, the mechanism was also determined for plum tree wood chip biochar and its UV activated biochar. Based on the analysis, it was found that the adsorption of ammonium on biochar is mainly because of ion exchange due to the presence of metals and functional groups. Through adsorption experiments it was found that, biochar 2, made of plum woodchip, has a higher affinity for capturing ammonium
over biochar 1 made of pine tree wood pellet because of the presence of metals and inorganic compounds on top of the surface. UV activation affect biochar’s adsorption capacity towards ammonium. Biochar 2 UV, after activating, has the highest adsorption capacity among all four biochars because of an increase in principle bulk elements like carbon. Apart from the characterization, calculations were made to find out the amount of biochar required to capture current ammonia emissions; this economic evaluation shown commercial feasibility of the
project