Bismuth vanadate, an agile photocatalyst for the degradation of malachite green dye

Abstract

Visible light-active bismuth vanadate (BiVO4) nanoflakes were successfully synthesized by co-precipitation technique. As prepared BiVO4 was characterized by X-ray Diffraction (XRD), Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR), Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) and Energy Dispersive Spectroscopy (EDS). Monoclinic forms of BiVO4 having average size of 37.76 nm were obtained. V-O, Bi-O and VO43- groups were observed by FTIR. The elemental mapping image showed 49.25% Bi, 9.69% V and 41.06% O which were found to be distributed homogeneously. As prepared BiVO4 was applied in the photocatalytic degradation of malachite green dye (MG). The maximum degradation was found to be 72.72% in 120 min using 500 W halogen lamp irradiation which may be due to the synergistic effect of lamp light and a stream of air. The optimum catalyst dose was found to be 0.1 g per 100 mL of 10 ppm dye concentration with the initial pH being 6.