Abstract In this study, a new application of polypyrrole (PPy) synthesized chemically in presence
of ferric chloride as an oxidant coated on rice husk ash (RHA) by oxidative chemical polymerization
method is used, ferric chloride has been found to be the chemical oxidant and water has been
reported the best solvent for chemical polymerization of pyrrole. The removal of anions, heavy
metals such as copper, iron and zinc and COD (chemical oxygen demand) from textile wastewater
using completely mixed batch reactor (CMBR) technique is investigated when polypyrrole and its
blend and nanocomposites with rice husk ash were used. Experiments were done using PPy/RHA
during 30 min with 5 min intervals. It is observed that by increasing the time (5–20 min) removal
efficiency increased but, after 20 min the efficiency did not increase significantly. It can be concluded
that RHA in the composites does not play significant role in the anions and COD removal but the
role of RHA in the removal of the metals is considerable and it causes an increase in the removal
efficiency of the composites. Besides, the morphology was tested by scanning electron microscopy
(SEM) to characterize the surface of PPy nanocomposites at very high magnification at an accelerating
voltage of 15 kV, and chemical structure was tested by Fourier Transform Infrared
spectroscopy (FTIR) in the wavelength range of 400–4000 cm
1, respectively. It was found that
PPy/RHA can be used as an effective adsorbent in the removal of anions, heavy metals and
COD from textile wastewater.