Fabrication and Characterization of Highly Efficient As-Synthesized WO3/Graphitic-C3 N4 Nanocomposite for Photocatalytic Degradation of Organic Compounds

Abstract

The incorporation of tungsten trioxide (WO3 ) by various concentrations of graphitic carbon nitride (g-C3 N4 ) was successfully studied. X-ray diffraction (XRD), Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM), and Diffused Reflectance UV-Vis techniques were applied to investigate morphological and microstructure analysis, diffused reflectance optical properties, and photocatalysis measurements of WO3/g-C3 N4 photocatalyst composite organic compounds. The photocatalytic activity of incorporating WO3 into g-C3 N4 composite organic compounds was evaluated by the photodegradation of both Methylene Blue (MB) dye and phenol under visible-light irradiation. Due to the high purity of the studied heterojunction composite series, no observed diffraction peaks appeared when incorporating WO3 into g-C3 N4 composite organic compounds. The particle size of the prepared composite organic compound photocatalysts revealed no evident influence through the increase in WO3 atoms from the SEM characteristic. The direct and indirect bandgap were recorded for different mole ratios of WO3/g-C3 N4, and indicated no apparent impact on bandgap energy with increasing WO3 content in the composite photocatalyst. The composite photocatalysts’ properties better understand their photocatalytic activity degradations. The pseudo-first-order reaction constants (K) can be calculated by examining the kinetic photocatalytic activity.