Preparation of a Z-scheme BiVO4/Cu2O/PPy heterojunction and studying its CO2 reducing properties†

Abstract

Herein, a new Z-scheme BiVO₄/Cu₂O/PPy heterostructure photocatalyst was developed with bismuth nitrate and ammonium vanadate as the precursors and sodium dodecyl benzyl sulfonate as the soft template. Through the spatial confinement effect of the sodium dodecyl benzyl sulfonate soft template, peanut-like BiVO₄ and the BiVO₄/Cu₂O/PPy heterojunction were synthesized. The best performance was observed for BiVO₄/Cu₂O/PPy (5%), and its photodegradation rate was 6.57 times higher than that of pure BiVO₄. The mechanism study showed that a light hole (h⁺), superoxide radical (·O₂⁻), and hydroxyl radical (·OH) participated in the CO₂ reduction process, which was different from the pure BiVO₄ reaction system. Therefore, the proposed approach provides a new method for applying BiVO₄/Cu₂O/PPy photocatalysts and developing the same type of heterojunction photocatalyst, and they have effective practical application for environmental remediation.