Preparation and Characterization of Activated Carbon from Lignin‐Rich Enzymatically Hydrolyzed Corncob Residues and Its Adsorption of Cu(II) Ions

Abstract The utilization of agricultural residues to produce bio‐based fuels, chemicals, and new materials is essential for the sustainable development of human society. Corncob residues are potential feedstocks to produce fermentable sugars because of their high cellulose content. The enzymatically hydrolyzed corncob residues containing a large amount of lignin are first explored as raw material to prepare activated carbon by chemical activation. In this study, the conditions for preparing activated carbon with CaCl 2 are optimized and compared with other activators; the activated carbon are characterized by FTIR, Brunauer–Emmett–Teller (BET), and SEM, as well as adsorption of Cu(II). The optimized conditions of preparing activated carbon from lignin‐rich enzymatically hydrolyzed corncob residues with CaCl 2 are obtained. The as‐prepared activated carbon exhibit good adsorption capacity of Cu(II), that is, the adsorption capacity is up to 49.21 mg g −1 under the optimized conditions.