Photocatalytic reduction of CO2 with H2O to solar fuels using TiO2-based nanocomposites

摘要

Photocatalytic conversion CO2 with H2O is potentially a promising approach to recycle CO2 back to hydrocarbon fuels. Among various photocatalysts that have been studied for CO2 photoreduction, TiO2 is considered as a convenient candidate in terms of chemical stability, low cost and non-toxicity. However, CO2 photoreduction with H2O still suffers from three major hurdles: (1) very low conversion efficiency resulting from a fast recombination rate of electron-hole (e~??h~+); (2) the less response of TiO2 to visible light; (3) the limitation in understanding the surface chemistry of TiO2 and the mechanism of CO2 adsorption and activation.