Photocatalytic hydrogen production using Fe2O3-based core shell nano particles with ZnS and CdS

Stability and efficiency of photocatalysts are important to realize the practical applications of them for photocatalytic hydrogen production from industrial sulfide effluent. Novel, magnetically separable core–shell nano photocatalysts viz., CdS/Fe2O3, ZnS/Fe2O3 and (CdS + ZnS)/Fe2O3 were prepared and their hydrogen evolution activity under visible light was examined. The XRD result shows that CdS and ZnS were very well coated on the surface of the iron oxide core shell particles. The HR-TEM result also confirms the core shell formation. (CdS + ZnS)/Fe2O3 evolved higher volume of hydrogen than the other catalysts. It is ascribed to rapid migration of excited electrons from (CdS + ZnS) toward Fe2O3 suppressing electron hole annihilation compared to other catalysts. The catalysts can be easily recovered from the reaction medium using external magnetic bar and so the photocatalyst can be reused without any mass loss. Hence, it can be a potential catalyst for recovery of hydrogen from industrial sulfide containing waste streams.