Heterogeneous Photocatalysis and its Potential Applications in Wastewater Treatment

To increase the photocatalytic activity of AgCl for environmental applications, a simple precipitation–deposition technique was established for the synthesis of the CoFe2O4/AgCl complex. For that, the phase of the nanoparticles was identified by X-ray diffraction (XRD), and the morphology was investigated by scanning electron micrograph (SEM), The gap energies of CoFe₂O₄(CFO) and AgCl, evaluated from the UV-VIS diffusion reflectance, were found to be 1.46 eV and 3.20 eV, respectively.  For the photodegradation of the orange acid dye, some operating parameters such as the mass ratio of CoFe₂O₄/ AgCl, the catalyst, the pH of the solution and initial AO61 concentration were optimized. 25%/75% mass ratio of CFO/ AgCl, catalyst dose of 1.25 g/L, pH ~ 6 and 50 mg/L initial concentration were found as optimal conditions for the degradation performance under visible light with an efficiency of 93% within only 240 min. Moreover, this hetero-system demonstrated effective oxidation by facilitating photo-electron transport with the deference potential.