Carbamazepine (CBZ), one of the most used pharmaceuticals worldwide and a Contaminant of Emerging Concern, represents a potential risk for the environment and human health. Wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) are a significant source of CBZ to the environment, polluting the whole water cycle. In this review, the CBZ presence and fate in the urban water cycle are addressed, with a focus on adsorption as a possible solution for its removal. Specifically, the scientific literature on CBZ removal by activated carbon and its possible substitute Biochar, is comprehensively scanned and summed up, in view of increasing the circularity in water treatments. CBZ adsorption onto activated carbon and biochar is analyzed considering several aspects, such as physicochemical characteristics of the adsorbents, operational conditions of the adsorption processes and adsorption kinetics and isotherms models. WWTPs usually show almost no removal of CBZ (even negative), whereas removal is witnessed in drinking water treatment plants through advanced treatments (even >90%). Among these, adsorption is considered one of the preferable methods, being economical and easier to operate. Adsorption capacity of CBZ is influenced by the characteristics of the adsorbent precursors, pyrolysis temperature and modification or activation processes. Among operational conditions, pH shows low influence on the process, as CBZ has no charge in most pH ranges. Differently, increasing temperature and rotational speed favor the adsorption of CBZ. The presence of other micro-contaminants and organic matter decreases the CBZ adsorption due to competition effects. These results, however, concern mainly laboratory-scale studies, hence, full-scale investigations are recommended to take into account the complexity of the real conditions.

Life cycle assessment (LCA) is a fundamental tool for evaluating the environmental and energy load of a production cycle. Its application to renewable energy production systems offers the possibility of identifying the environmental benefits of such processes—especially those related to the by-products of production processes (i.e., digestion or biochar). Biochar has received worldwide interest because of its potential uses in bioenergy production, due to its coproducts (bio-oil and syngas), as well as in global warming mitigation, sustainable agriculture, pollutant removal, and other uses. Biochar production and use of soil is a strategy for carbon sequestration that could contribute to the reduction of emissions, providing simultaneous benefits to soil and opportunities for bioenergy generation. However, to confirm all of biochar’s benefits, it is necessary to characterize the environmental and energy loads of the production cycle. In this work, soil carbon sequestration, nitrous oxide emissions, use of fertilizers, and use of water for irrigation have been considered in the biochar’s LCA, where the latter is used as a soil conditioner. Primary data taken from experiments and prior studies, as well as open-source available databases, were combined to evaluate the environmental impacts of energy production from biomass, as well as the biochar life cycle, including pre- and post-conversion processes. From the found results, it can be deduced that the use of gasification production of energy and biochar is an attractive strategy for mitigating the environmental impacts analyzed here—especially climate change, with a net decrease of about −8.3 × 10³ kg CO₂ eq. Finally, this study highlighted strategic research developments that combine the specific characteristics of biochar and soil that need to be amended.

The purpose of this manuscript is to present a review of laboratory experiments (including methodology and results) that use biochar, a specific carbon obtained by a pyrolysis process from different feedstocks, as an alternative material for heavy metal adsorption from groundwater. In recent years, many studies have been conducted regarding the application of innovative materials to water decontamination to develop a more sustainable approach to remediation processes. The use of biochar for groundwater remediation has particularly attracted the interest of researchers because it permits the reuse of materials that would be otherwise disposed of, in accordance with circular economy, and reduces the generation of greenhouse gases if compared to the use of virgin materials. A review of the different approaches and results reported in the current literature could be useful because when applying remediation technologies at the field scale, a preliminary phase in which the suitability of the adsorbent is evaluated at the lab scale is often necessary. This paper is therefore organised with a short description of the involved metals and of the biochar production and composition. A comprehensive analysis of the current knowledge related to the use of biochar in groundwater remediation at the laboratory scale to obtain the characteristic parameters of the process that are necessary for the upscaling of the technology at the field scale is also presented. An overview of the results achieved using different experimental conditions, such as the chemical properties and dosage of biochar as well as heavy metal concentrations with their different values of pH, is reported. At the end, numerical studies useful for the interpretation of the experiment results are introduced.

Biochar has been used in various applications, e.g., as a soil conditioner and in remediation of contaminated water, wastewater, and gaseous emissions. In the latter application, biochar was shown to be a suitable alternative to activated carbon, providing high treatment efficiency. Since biochar is a by-product of waste pyrolysis, its use allows for compliance with circular economics. Thus, this research aims to obtain a detailed characterization of three carbonaceous materials: an activated carbon (CARBOSORB NC 1240^®) and two biochars (RE-CHAR^® and AMBIOTON^®). In particular, the objective of this work is to compare the properties of three carbonaceous materials to evaluate whether the application of the two biochars is the same as that of activated carbon. The characterization included, among others, particle size distribution, elemental analysis, pH, scanning electron microscope, pore volume, specific surface area, and ionic exchange capacity. The results showed that CARBOSORB NC 1240^® presented a higher specific surface (1126.64 m²/g) than AMBIOTON^® (256.23 m²/g) and RE-CHAR^® (280.25 m²/g). Both biochar and activated carbon belong to the category of mesoporous media, showing a pore size between 2 and 50 nm (20–500 Å). Moreover, the chemical composition analysis shows similar C, H, and N composition in the three carbonaceous materials while a higher O composition in RE-CHAR^® (9.9%) than in CARBOSORB NC 1240 ^® (2.67%) and AMBIOTON^® (1.10%). Differences in physical and chemical properties are determined by the feedstock and pyrolysis or gasification temperature. The results obtained allowed to compare the selected materials among each other and with other carbonaceous adsorbents.

Two laboratory tests were carried out to verify the suitability of an Italian commercial biochar as an adsorbing material. The chosen contaminant, considered dissolved in groundwater, was As. The circular economic concept demands the use of such waste material. Its use has been studied in recent years on several contaminants. The possibility of using an efficient material at low cost could help the use of low-impact technologies like permeable reactive barriers (PRBs). A numerical model was used to derive the kinetic constant for two of the most used isotherms. The results are aligned with others derived from the literature, but they also indicate that the use of a large amount of biochar does not improve the efficiency of the removal. The particular origin of the biochar, together with its grain size, causes a decrease in contact time required for the adsorption. Furthermore, it is possible that a strong local decrease in the hydraulic conductibility does not allow for a correct dispersion of the flow, thereby limiting its efficiency.