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Nitrogen and phosphorous‐doped porous carbon xerogels as metal‐free catalysts for environmental catalytic peroxide oxidation of 4‐nitrophenol
Author(s) -
Fathy Nady A.,
Shouman Mona A.,
Aboelenin Reham M. M.
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
asia‐pacific journal of chemical engineering
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.348
H-Index - 35
eISSN - 1932-2143
pISSN - 1932-2135
DOI - 10.1002/apj.2017
Subject(s) - catalysis , chemistry , inorganic chemistry , fourier transform infrared spectroscopy , carbon fibers , peroxide , mesoporous material , phosphoric acid , nuclear chemistry , materials science , chemical engineering , organic chemistry , composite number , engineering , composite material
Abstract This work reports an environmental benign porous carbon catalyst for the catalytic peroxide oxidation of 4‐nitrophenol (4‐NP) pollutant. Nitrogen and phosphorous‐doped carbon xerogels as metal‐free catalysts, which are namely as CX30, CX50 and CX75 with corresponding to initial concentrations of H 3 PO 4 acid (30, 50 and 75 v/v %) were synthesized. Nitrogen gas adsorption measurements of the prepared carbon catalysts were performed at −196 °C, while Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) and high resolution scanning electron microscopy–energy dispersive X‐ray spectroscopy (SEM–EDS) analyses were examined for the sample of CX75 which appeared high catalytic performance. The effect of various factors such as temperature, catalyst loading, H 2 O 2 dose and initial concentration of 4‐NP on the catalytic oxidation performance of the metal‐free catalysts was studied at pH = 4. Results revealed that the phosphoric acid activation of nitrogen‐doped resorcinol‐formaldehyde xerogel developed significant influence on the porosity and surface chemistry characteristics of the hereby catalysts. Increasing the concentration of H 3 PO 4 enhances the microporosity at expense of mesoporosity yielding micro‐mesoporous carbons with surface area as high as 442 m 2 /g. EDS and FTIR analyses confirmed the presence of phosphorous‐ and nitrogen‐containing functional groups with high content of carbon and oxygen groups. During catalytic wet peroxide oxidation experiments, the CX75 catalyst exhibits complete decomposition 4‐NP (100%) within 60 min. Moreover, reusability experiments with this catalyst were run through three cycles and revealed high stability where up to 52.6% conversion of 4‐NP in the third recycle was occurred at 120 min. © 2016 Curtin University of Technology and John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.