SnO 2-based materials for pesticide degradation

Abstract

This study presents the results of the degradation of the pesticide atrazine using electrochemical and photo-assisted electrochemical degradation techniques using SnO 2-containing electrode of nominal composition electrodes of composition Ti/Ru X Sn 1− X O 2 (where X = 0.10, 0.15, 0.20, 0.25 and 0.30). The materials were characterized ex situ and in situ in order to correlate the observed atrazine removal rates with electrode morphology/composition. The results obtained demonstrate the effectiveness of the photo-assisted electrochemical degradation. Using purely electrochemical methods the rate of atrazine removal is almost zero at all the electrodes studied. However, the application of photo-assisted degradation results in almost complete atrazine removal in 1 h of electrolysis. The efficiency of atrazine degradation does not seem to be greatly affected by the electrode material or by SnO 2 content, but the overall COD removal is dependent on the SnO 2 content. Overall, the SnO 2-containing electrodes do not reach the level of COD removal (maximum ∼21%) seen for the Ti/Ru 0.3Ti 0.7O 2 electrode. An interesting correlation between the morphology factor ( φ) and chemical oxygen demand removal is observed.