The objective of this study is to evaluate the catalytic performance of a rice hull-based silica supported iron catalyst on heterogeneous Fenton-like degradation of a xanthene dye, Rhodamine B. The catalyst was found to consist of aggregated silica nanospheres with about 3 wt.% of iron loaded. The effects of various reaction parameters such as initial dye concentration, catalyst dosage, H2O2 concentration, pH and temperature on the catalytic degradation of Rhodamine B were studied. Almost 100% decolorization was achieved within 10 min at an initial pH of 3.0. Chemical oxygen demand measurement shows that considerably high degree of mineralization could be achieved along with the decolorization of Rhodamine B. The degree of mineralization was further enhanced by using stepwise addition strategy in which the impact of adverse reactions could be minimized. In addition, the effects of foreign ions and ionic strength were investigated and both promoting and inhibiting effects on the degradation rate were observed. In particular, common salts found in textile wastewater such as Na2SO4 and NaCl could even enhance the degradation rate in this catalyst system. FTIR and ICP-MS analysis shows that the catalyst exhibits low iron leaching, good structural stability and no loss of performance in at least three times of repeated use. (C) 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.