Photocatalytic Degradation of Phenol Using Photodeposited Pt Nanoparticles on Titania.

In this study, the photodeposition synthesized Pt-titania (Pt/P25) photocatalysts with various amount of Pt (0.5-5.0 wt.%) were characterized in detail by Brunauer-Emmett-Teller surface area analysis (BET), inductively coupled plasma with optical emission spectroscopy (ICP-EOS), X-ray diffraction (XRD), UV-vis diffuse reflectance spectroscopy (DRS UV-vis), attenuated total reflection (ATR), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS). The photocatalytic activity of the investigated catalysts was studied towards the photocatalytic degradation of phenol. The best performance was obtained for the 3.0 wt.% Pt/TiO₂. The concentration of photocatalyst, the initial phenol concentration and pH value of the reaction solution was studied in detail. The obtained results show that the reaction rate increases with increasing catalyst concentration and decreases with increasing phenol concentration. The highest degradation efficiency was observed for a neutral pH. In overall, the results of this study show that the Pt/TiO₂ photocatalysts can efficiently improve the decomposition of phenol in the presence of UV light.