Abstract
Photocatalysis is attracting more and more interest because it offers efficient environmental friendly exploitation of solar energy for several end uses. In this context, research into the reactivity of photocatalysts on surfaces is of considerable importance. In this paper, the introduction of ammonium carbonate, a cost-effective and nontoxic reagent, is shown to influence preferential crystal growth of the photocatalyst BiVO4 along its {040} facet at high pH, thereby increasing the concentration of OH species on its surface, resulting in a substantial improvement in its visible-light-induced photocatalytic activity. As a result, 6 times higher rate of photoinduced degradation of ethylene has been measured compared to the best rate obtained with TiO2 photocatalyst ever produced by our group and even 10 times higher than with the reference Degussa P25 titania.
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