Effect of Au Plasmonic Material on Poly M-Toluidine for Photoelectrochemical Hydrogen Generation from Sewage Water

Ahmed Adel A Abdelazeez; N M A Hadia; Abdel-Hamid I Mourad; Gehad Abd El-Fatah; Mohamed Shaban; Ashour M Ahmed; Meshal Alzaid; Nizamudeen Cherupurakal; Mohamed Rabia

doi:10.3390/polym14040768

Effect of Au Plasmonic Material on Poly M-Toluidine for Photoelectrochemical Hydrogen Generation from Sewage Water

Polymers (Basel). 2022 Feb 16;14(4):768. doi: 10.3390/polym14040768.

Authors

Ahmed Adel A Abdelazeez¹, N M A Hadia^{2

3}, Abdel-Hamid I Mourad^{4

5}, Gehad Abd El-Fatah⁶, Mohamed Shaban^{7

8}, Ashour M Ahmed⁷, Meshal Alzaid², Nizamudeen Cherupurakal⁴, Mohamed Rabia^{6

7}

Affiliations

¹ Nanoscale Science, Chemistry Department, University of North Carolina at Charlotte, Charlotte, NC 28223, USA.
² Physics Department, College of Science, Jouf University, Al-Jouf, Sakaka P.O. Box 2014, Saudi Arabia.
³ Basic Sciences Research Unit, Jouf University, Sakaka P.O. Box 2014, Saudi Arabia.
⁴ Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Department, College of Engineering, United Arab Emirate University, Al Ain 15551, United Arab Emirates.
⁵ Mechanical Design Department, Faculty of Engineering, Helwan University, Cairo 11795, Egypt.
⁶ Nanomaterials Science Research Laboratory, Chemistry Department, Faculty of Science, Beni-Suef University, Beni Suef 62514, Egypt.
⁷ Nanophotonics and Applications Lab, Physics Department, Faculty of Science, Beni-Suef University, Beni Suef 62514, Egypt.
⁸ Physics Department, Faculty of Science, Islamic University of Madinah, P.O. Box 170, Madinah 42351, Saudi Arabia.

Abstract

This study provides H₂ gas as a renewable energy source from sewage water splitting reaction using a PMT/Au photocathode. So, this study has a dual benefit for hydrogen generation; at the same time, it removes the contaminations of sewage water. The preparation of the PMT is carried out through the polymerization process from an acid medium. Then, the Au sputter was carried out using the sputter device under different times (1 and 2 min) for PMT/Au-1 min and PMT/Au-2min, respectively. The complete analyses confirm the chemical structure, such as XRD, FTIR, HNMR, SEM, and Vis-UV optical analyses. The prepared electrode PMT/Au is used for the hydrogen generation reaction using Na₂S₂O₃ or sewage water as an electrolyte. The PMT crystalline size is 15 nm. The incident photon to current efficiency (IPCE) efficiency increases from 2.3 to 3.6% (at 390 nm), and the number of H₂ moles increases from 8.4 to 33.1 mmol h^-1 cm^-2 for using Na₂S₂O₃ and sewage water as electrolyte, respectively. Moreover, all the thermodynamic parameters, such as activation energy (E_a), enthalpy (ΔH*), and entropy (ΔS*), were calculated; additionally, a simple mechanism is mentioned for the water-splitting reaction.

Keywords: photocatalyst; photoelectrochemical H2 generation; plasmonic Au nanoparticles; poly(m toluidine); sewage water; water splitting.

Abstract

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