Effect of reaction conditions on methyl red degradation mediated by boron and nitrogen doped TiO2

Nowadays the employment of renewable and sustainable energy sources, and solar light as main option, becomes an urgent need. Photocatalytic processes received great attention in wastewater treatment due to their cheapness, environmental compatibility and optimal performances. Despite the general low selectivity of the photocatalysts, an accurate optimisation of the operational parameters needs to be carried out in order to maximise the process yield. Because of this reason, the present contribution aims to deepen either the knowledge in boron and/or nitrogen doped TiO2-based systems and their employment in methyl red removal from aqueous solutions. The samples were obtained by coprecipitation and characterised by XRD, SEM, BET specific surface area, UV-vis and XPS techniques. The catalytic activity was for the first time carefully evaluated with respect to methyl red photodegradation in different conditions as a function of working pH, counter-ions and pre-adsorption time. An ad-hoc study was performed on the importance of the pre-adsorption of the dye, suggesting that an extended adsorption is useless for the catalyst photoactivity, while a partial coverage is preferable. The photocatalytic tests demonstrate the positive influence of boron doping in photo-activated reactions and the great importance of the operational parameters with respect to the simple methyl red bleaching rather than the overall pollutant mineralisation. It is proved, indeed, that different working pH, acidifying means and substrate pre-adsorption time can enhance or limit the catalyst performances with respect to the complete pollutant degradation rather than its partial breakage.