Photocatalytic Reduction of Nitrate in Aqueous Solutions using Ag-doped TiO2/UV Process

Pollution of water resources to nitrate is an environmental problem in many parts of the world. This problem possibly causes diseases such as methemoglobinemia, lymphatic system cancer and Leukemia. Hence, nitrate control and removal from water resources is necessary. Considering that application of nanomaterials in treatment of environmental pollutants has become an interesting method, in this research use of Ag-doped TiO2 nanoparticles synthesized through photodeposition produced under UV irradiation was studied for removal of nitrate from aqueous solutions. Three nitrate concentrations of 20, 50, and 100 mg/L were considered. In order to determine the effect of Ag-doped TiO2 nanoparticles on nitrate removal, dosages of 0.1, 0.4, 0.8 and 1.2 g/L nanoparticles were used; pH range of 5-9 was also considered. The effect of Ag-doped TiO2 nanoparticles both in darkness and under UV irradiation was studied. Moreover, the presence of chloride and sulfate anions on the system removal efficiency was investigated. The optimum performance of nitrate removal (95.5%) was obtained using nitrate concentration of 100 mg/L, in acidic pH and 0.8 g/L Ag-TiO2. Increase of nanoparticle dosage up to 0.8 g/L, increased the removal efficiency, but for 1.2 g/L dosage of nanoparticles, the removal efficiency decreased. Maximum reduction performance without nanoparticles, under UV irradiation and under darkness conditions were 32% and 23.3%, respectively. In addition, we found that presence of sulfate and chloride anions in aqueous solution reduced efficiency of nitrate removal. Results of this study showed that Ag-doped TiO2 nanoparticles may be efficiently used for nitrate removal from aqueous solutions.