This study reports the novel dry activation for preparingactivatedcarbon with a high specific surface area from rice husks using solidNaOH. Materials were characterized by N2adsorption, X-raydiffraction, infrared spectroscopy, and scanning electron microscopy.The effects of mass ratio (1–4) and the activation process(dry activation or impregnation) on the surface area were studied,explicating the mechanism of pore development. With a mass ratio of3, carbons prepared by dry activation possessed a much higher surfacearea of 2841 m2/g than the 933 m2/g for impregnation.For the adsorption of phenol, their maximum adsorption capacitieswere 351.4 and 160.8 mg/g, fitting with the Langmuir model. In addition,the economic analysis estimated a significant gross profit marginof 40.2% for the product. Therefore, it is demonstrated that dry activationis an effective and convenient method for obtaining low cost activatedcarbon with outstanding surface area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]