Two Birds with One Stone: Copper-Based Adsorbents Used for Photocatalytic Oxidation of Hg⁰ (Gas) after Removal of PH₃

Abstract

Cu X /TiO 2 adsorbents with CuO as the active component were prepared via a simple impregnation method for efficient purification of phosphine (PH 3 ) under the conditions of low temperatures (90 °C) and low oxygen concentration (1%). The PH 3 breakthrough capacity of optimal adsorbent (Cu 30 /TiO 2 ) is 136.2 mg(PH 3 )•g sorbent −1, and the excellent dephosphorization performance is mainly attributed to its abundant sur face-active oxygen and alkaline sites, large specific surface area, and strong interaction between CuO and the support TiO 2 . Surprisingly, CuO is converted to Cu 3 P after the dephosphorization by Cu X /TiO 2 . Since Cu 3 P is a P-type semiconductor with high added value, the deactivated adsorbent (Cu 3 P/TiO 2 ) is an efficient heterostructure photocatalyst for photocatalytic removal of Hg 0 (gas) with the Hg 0 removal performance of 92.64% under visible light. This study provides a feasible strategy for the efficient removal and resource conversion of PH 3 under low-temperature conditions and the alleviation of the environmental risk of secondary pollution.