Insight into the adsorption kinetics models for the removal of contaminants from aqueous solutions

Abstract The past decade has seen a boom in environmental adsorption studies on the adsorptive removal of pollutants from the aqueous phase. A large majority of works treat kinetic modeling as a mere routine to describe the macroscopic trend of adsorptive uptake by using common models, often without careful appraisal of the characteristics and validity of the models. This review compiles common kinetic models and discusses their origins, features, modified versions (if any), and applicability with regard to liquid adsorption modeling for both batch adsorption and dynamic adsorption systems. Indiscriminate applications, ambiguities, and controversies are highlighted and clarified. The appropriateness of linear regression for correlating kinetic data is discussed. This review concludes with a note on the current scenario and the future of kinetics modeling of liquid adsorption.