Effect of chlorine ion on the crystalline and photocatalytic activity of BiOCl for the degradation of Rhodamine B

Two kinds of layer-structured BiOCl photocatalysts (BiOCl-01 and BiOCl-02) were synthesized using NaBiO3 and HCl as the raw materials, and KCl as the Cl− conditioning agent. These photocatalysts were characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), high resolution transmission electron microscopy (HRTEM), and ultraviolet visible diffuse reflectance spectra (DRS) measurements. The effects of chlorine ion in the reaction solutions on the crystalline of BiOCl and photodegradation of Rhodamine B (RhB) under 365 nm and 530 nm monocharomatic light irradiation were investigated. The XRD spectra confirmed the formation and purity of BiOCl photocatalysts, revealed that Cl− ion existed in the preparation solution restrained the growth of BiOCl and influenced the surface configuration. The TEM and HRTEM analysis gave the similar results with XRD. The band gaps of BiOCl-01 and BiOCl-02 were estimated about 3.19 and 3.29 eV, respectively. The photocatalytic degradation results of RhB under 365 nm showed that the photocatalytic activity of BiOCl-02 was better than that of BiOCl-01, and the main active species were h+ and . Meanwhile, the photosensitized results of RhB under 530 nm indicated that the photosensitized activity of BiOCl-01 and BiOCl-02 was similar, and the main active species was .