Effective BiOCl Electrons Collector for Enhancing Photocarrier Separation of Bi2WO6/BiOCl Composite

Abstract

Enhancing photocarrier separation is a key step of photocatalysis, and in situ constructed composition interface is an advanced method to achieve this aim. Therefore, we report a face-to-face Bi2WO6/BiOCl (BWOC) which was synthesized via the continuous in situ ion-exchange method. As UV light is harmful to the human body, BWOC exhibits excellent photocatalytic activity only in visible light, and this is an important feature because visible light is a human-friendly operating condition. Under 50 W visible LED lamp illumination, unexcited BiOCl (BOC) only extracts electrons of excited Bi2WO6 (BWO), and holes remain on BWO, resulting in excellent photocarrier spatial separation efficiency through the face-to-face interface. This is why BWOC can be safe to use for the removal of hazardous substances. Compared with BWO and BOC, BWOC possesses 2.6 and 5.6 times higher photodegradation activity than RhB. This work provides a novel insight of efficient visible light photocatalytic system for environmental remediation.