Design of photoreactor with high sunlight concentration for improved photocatalytic degradation of dye pollutant

Abstract

A homemade reactor was designed and fabricated with the use of P25 Degussa TiO2 as the photocatalyst. P25 Degussa nanoparticle is a mixture of 75% anatase and 25% rutile. It is more efficient than pure anatase polymorphs because anatase had a larger band gap. This will increase the useful wavelength range of photoactivity and the also size of the rutile crystal lattice become smaller, thus enhance the photocatalytic reaction. The performance of the homemade reactor was evaluated with a different parameter like the different type of dyes, different dosage, different concentration and compare with the conventional method (beaker). The photolysis of methyl blue (MB), methyl orange (MO) and Rhodamine B (RhB) in the absence of photocatalyst recorded an overall efficiency of 64%, 56%, and 48% respectively. The photodegradation of dyes in the presence of photocatalyst achieved an overall efficiency of 85%, 49%, and 96%, respectively. The overall efficiency can achieve 100% after 2 h of reaction time with 2 g of P25 Degussa. The homemade reactor reached a better degradation rate than that of a conventional method (beaker).