PHOTORESPONSE OF LIGNOCELLULOSE MODIFIED TiO2 TOWARDS WATERSPLITTING FOR HYDROGEN ENERGY PRODUCTION FROM COTTON STALKDRY BIOMASS

Abstract

Photoelectron catalytic water splitting process is a promising means to solve both fossil fueldepletion and environmental pollution problems as well as for sustainable hydrogenproduction using renewable natural resources like sunlight and biomass. Hence, in this studythe opportunity for structural development of lignocellulose (LGO) modified TiO2nanomaterial towards highly efficient and realistic photo-catalysis applications are evidentlyabundant after improved light absorption, charge-carrier dynamics, and improved particlesize porosity that benefits photo-catalysis functionalities. LGO-TiO2 nanoparticle (≈19.57 nm)for photo-catalysis was prepared via sol-gel method. The structural and morphologicalcharacterizations of the synthesized nanomaterial are carried out using UV-Vis, FTIR, XRD,SEM, and EDX techniques, based upon which the mechanistic insights are discussed. SEManalysis suggests that an average size of particle grain size is found to be in the range of 0.5-4 μm. The prepared lignocellulose modified TiO2 satisfies the accepted energy band gap (Eg =2.81 eV) for better photo-catalytic water splitting reaction. The photocurrent densities ofregular TiO2 and LGO-TiO2 towards water splitting reaction under light illumination fromxenon lamp were compared and found in reasonable agreement. The work also studied theapplication of visible light illuminated LGO-TiO2 photo-anode photo-catalyst to the overallwater splitting with a photo-conversion efficiency of 18.91% higher than that of pure TiO2nanoparticles. The photo-catalytic activity was extended to evaluate the decomposition ofmethylene blue (MB) as a testing model reaction under visible light irradiation. Therefore,parametric conditions like pH, initial concentration, and catalyst loading were examined toprove the degradation efficiency.