Photocatalysts and photoelectrodes for obtaining renewable fuels

Abstract

The use of renewable energy, as solar energy, is considered as a viable alternative to avoid the excessive fossil fuel consumption. However, the use of large-scale renewable energy is still a challenge because of its intermittence. A solution to solve the mismatch between demand-consumption is to obtain renewable fuels, which can be generated from abundant sources, as CO2 and H2O, using as an energy input the electric energy obtained from renewable sources. The study of semiconductors and the presence of multiphase catalysts are interesting strategies to design active photocatalysts for renewable fuels obtaining. In this context, this project proposes the preparation of oxides (TiO2, CuO, BiVO4), chalcogenides (CuGaS2, Sb2S3, SnxSbySz, WS2, MoS2) and hybrid organic and inorganic perovskites by different synthetic routes and to evaluate the effect of dopants on the activity photocatalytic for water splitting and CO2 reduction. These materials will be obtained by undergraduate students (scientific initiation), postgraduate students (masters and doctoral students) and postdoctoral fellows under the applicant supervision, at the Laboratory for Nanostructured Materials Eletrochemically Fabricated (NANOFAEL). (AU)