Efficiently synchronous removal of micro/nanoplastics and coexisting organic compounds using interconnected macro-meso-microporous pristine biochar: easily accessible binding sites and competitive adsorption mitigation

Highly qualified decontamination of micro/nanoplastics in water tends to be restricted by insufficient capacity and the competitive binding of coexisting organic compounds for limited sites, an issue that has rarely been addressed extensively, and suitable methods are lacked. This work examines the novel honeycomb like pristine magnetic biochar (HM-M-LBC) with intimately interconnected macro-meso-microporous structures for capturing of micro/nanoplastics and coexisting organic compounds. It found that attaching capacities for varying micro/nanoplastics reached 1328.02–2369.67 mg/g, a dramatic breakthrough versus current approaches, which attributed to the plenty amount of easily accessible binding sites provided by macro-meso-microporous structures throughout the whole matrix. According to HM-M-LBC packed column reactor, continuous and thorough removal of micro and nanoplastics and as well as typical organic compounds including dichlorophenol and dye, in large scale real water was first proved, implying mitigation of interfering effect from the coexisting compounds. This was also demonstrated that the three kinds of pore structures with sufficient binding sites and differences in sizes of pollutants synergistically triggered different binding pathways, consequently eliminating steric hindrance and also competition for sites. This study delivers a superior adsorbent for the effective and low-cost remediation of micro/nanoplastics contaminated water even organic compounds coexisted, and opens a novel strategy for site-partitioning capture in multipollutant systems.