Synergistic effect of electrochemically fabricated polyaniline nanofibers and silver for efficient solar steam generation

Abstract

Solar steam generation (SSG) has been recognized as a promising and green technology to resolve the scarcity of drinking water in the near future. On the other hand, there are still several challenges associated with SSG system to its practical utilization. Design of suitable photothermal materials with high solar absorption and conversion efficiency is one of the challenges associated with the SSG technology. Herein, we demonstrated a strategy for the fabrication of bilayer structure of porous polyaniline (PANI) nanofibers and conducting silver (Ag) on a carbon cloth (PANI/Ag@CC) substrate using a facile electrochemical deposition approach. As prepared binder-free PANI/Ag@CC showed an excellent steam generation rate of 2.21 kg/m2h with superior evaporation efficiency of 98.0 % under 1 sun illumination when used for the SSG application. Furthermore, the bilayered PANI/Ag@CC exhibited excellent durability, effective seawater desalination and wastewater purification. The superior SSG performance is associated with the synergistic effect of surface plasmon resonance of Ag and porous PANI nanofibers. Therefore, practically simple fabrication, outstanding evaporation rate and water purification properties convince that the PANI/Ag@CC structure can be a promising candidate for SSG applications.