Abstract
In the quest for harnessing more power from the sun for water treatment by photoelectrochemical degradation, we prepared a novel photoanode of exfoliated graphite (EG)–ZnO nanocomposite. The nanocomposite was characterised by X-ray diffractometry, energy dispersive spectroscopy, Brunauer–Emmett–Teller surface area analyser, thermal gravimetric analyser, and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy. The EG–ZnO nanocomposite was fabricated into a photoanode and applied for the photoelectrochemical degradation of 0.1 × 10−4 M eosin yellowish dye in 0.1 M Na2SO4 under visible light irradiation. The degradation was monitored with a visible spectrophotometer. The photoelectrochemical degradation process resulted in enhanced degradation efficiency of ca. 93 % with kinetic rate of 11.0 × 10−3 min−1 over photolysis and electrochemical oxidation processes which exhibited lower degradation efficiencies of 35 and 40 % respectively.
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The financial support of the following are gratefully acknowledged: Nanotechnology Innovation Centre, Mintek South Africa; The Centre for Nanomaterials Science Research, University of Johannesburg; The Faculty of Science, University of Johannesburg; and The National Research Foundation, South Africa.
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Ntsendwana, B., Sampath, S., Mamba, B.B. et al. Photoelectrochemical degradation of eosin yellowish dye on exfoliated graphite–ZnO nanocomposite electrode. J Mater Sci: Mater Electron 27, 592–598 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10854-015-3793-6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10854-015-3793-6