Novel BIVO4@C3N4@GO Composites with Higher Photocatalytic Performance

BiVO4, BiVO4@C3N4 and BiVO4@C3N4@GO composite photo-catalysts were synthesized, and characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), energy dispersive spectrometry (EDS), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), ultraviolet-visible diffuse reflectance spectroscopy (UV-vis DRS), Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), and Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET) surface area techniques. The photocatalytic activity was evaluated on the degradation of methylene blue (MB) under visible light irradiation, which denoted that the BiVO4@C(3)N(4)GO ternary composite outperformed the binary composite BiVO4@C3N4 and BiVO4. Then the effects of catalyst dosage, initial pH value, and initial methylene blue concentration on the degradation process were investigated systematically. The improvement of visible-light photocatalytic degradation performance was attributed to the enhanced visible light absorption, larger surface area, higher adsorption ability, and prolonged lifetime of photo-generated electron-hole pairs. The recycle experiments results showed that the BiVO4@C3N4@GO composite had excellent photo-stability for MB photocatalytic degradation.