PHOTOCATALYTIC HYDROGEN GENERATION BY ETHANOL ASSISTED WATER SPLITTING REACTION USING MIXED OXIDE OF Ba AND Mn

Abstract

Visible light active BaMnOx type photocatalyst was synthesized by using sol-gel method. The photocatalyst was characterized by X- ray diffraction, BET-SA, and UV-visible diffused reflectance spectroscopy (UV-DRS). BaMnOx photocatalyst exhibited an optical band gap of 2.9 eV with the absorption predominantly in visible region of the light spectrum. The crystallite size of BaMnOx is 24.63 nm as calculated by the Debye Scherer equation. The BET surface area value for BaMnOx photocatalyst was found to be 16.2 m2/g. The photocatalytic hydrogen generation was carried out by using Pt as co-catalyst and ethanol as a sacrificial donor. Hydrogen generation was investigated by ethanol assisted water splitting reaction under visible light irradiation, using a compact glass reactor and tungsten lamp as a source of visible light. The rate of photocatalytic hydrogen evolution was observed to be 7463 μmol.g-1.h-1 of Pt-BaMnOx photocatalyst