Nickel phthalocyanine@graphene oxide/TiO2 as an efficient degradation catalyst of formic acid toward hydrogen production

Abstract

A new photocatalytic system was introduced to degrade formic acid toward hydrogen production using nickel(II) phthalocyanine (NiPc)@graphene oxide (GO)/TiO2 as the catalyst. Synthesis of NiPc was performed in the presence of GO leading to a homogeneous distribution of NiPc on GO. While TiO2 promoted the reaction using each of NiPc and GO under visible light, the reaction was carried out with superior rate using NiPc@GO/TiO2. In this reaction, GO minimized the band gap of TiO2 through contributing its Fermi levels and NiPc escalated the photocatalytic reaction rate as a sensitizing agent. The reaction released hydrogen with the rate of 1.38 mmol h−1 and TOF = 77 h−1.