Nanostructured polypyrrole cathode based dual rotating disk photo fuel cell for textile wastewater purification and electricity generation

摘要

Polypyrrole (PPy) nanosilk, nanowire array and nanorod array films are synthesized on carbon cloth substrate through electrochemical polymerization by only controlling the concentration of p-toluenesulfonate acid (TsOH) in electrolyte. The nanostructured films exhibit much better electricity generation performances in photoelectrochemical cell in comparison with flat film being as cathode due to their high surface areas and low combined series resistances. The optimized synthesized films are further applied in an efficient dual rotating disk photo fuel cell to treat real textile wastewater with the initial chemical oxygen demand (COD) and conductivity of 108 +/- 5 mgO(2) L-1 and 11600 mS cm(-1), respectively, for simultaneous electricity generation. With nanosilk film as cathode, 0.44 V open circuit voltage and 2.00mA short circuit current are obtained, the maximum output power reaches 0.22mW. Similar results are also obtained with nanowire and nanorod arrays. Stable currents can be measured during 4 h treatment when the output voltage is 0 (short circuit condition), 0.15 and 0.25 V with any film. The COD is removed to 28 mgO(2) L-1 under short circuit condition with nanosilk or nanowire cathode. However, they are 36 and 47 mgO(2) L-1, respectively, when nanorod and flat cathodes are used. Moreover, the effects of pH and rotating speed are also investigated in this research. (c) 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.