Electrocatalytic Degradation of Methyl Orange using Nano-Fe3O4 Supported on Conductive Carbon Black as Particle Electrode

Abstract

Using conductive carbon black (CCB) as a carrier, a heterogeneous catalyst with Fe3O4 as the active material (Fe3O4/CCB) was prepared by the impregnation method, and its performance in degrading of high-concentration methyl orange (MO) wastewater in the three-dimensional electro-Fenton system (3DEF) was explored. Characterization by TEM and XRD showed that Fe3O4 was uniformly loaded on CCB, and due to the synergistic effect of Fe3O4 and CCB in promoting degradation of pollutants, the degradation rate of this catalyst was 2.14 times higher than that of Fe3O4 alone. Under the optimal conditions, the COD removal rate and MO decolorization rate reached the maximum, values of 75.02% and 93.75%, respectively. After 5 cycles, the MO degradation rate was still 83.83%, indicating that the prepared particle electrode has good reusability. In addition, a reasonable catalytic mechanism of the 3DEF system for MO mineralization was proposed, confirming that the hydroxyl radicals were particularly important in the oxidation.