The Application of As-Synthesized Silver-Doped Anatase TiO2 Nanoparticle onto the Surface of Fe-ZSM-5 Zeolite for the Degradation of Organic Dye with UV Light

The discharge of dying wastewater effluent from the textile industry into the water body can be toxic due to their long time presence in the environment and is the leading major cause of the environmental damage. It is difficult to remove color from dye effluents with conventional wastewater treatment methods. Then advanced oxidation processes (AOPs) are potentially powerful method to remove these organic contaminations.

In the present study the photocatalytic performance of the silver-doped titanium dioxide (TiO2) nanoparticles over the surface of Fe-ZSM-5 zeolite was investigated trough the degradation of reactive red 195 dyes in water under light UV.  The Effects of different titanium dioxide to Fe-ZSM-5 ratio, dye concentration, photocatalyst concentration and pH of the water solution was studied at room temperature.

The EDX analysis, a semiquantitative elemental analysis of the surface which indicates that Ti and silver (Ag) was successfully loaded on the surface of Fe-ZSM-5 zeolite. The result of EDX shows that the mean weight percentage of Si, Fe, Ti and Ag was 19.98, 5.48, 56.95 and 15.65%, respectively. The SEM images showed that unloaded Fe-ZSM-5 zeolite has a well-defined cubic shape and tends to change a spherical regular morphology and a uniform nanoparticle of TiO2 and Ag with spherical shape distributed onto Ag-TiO2/Fe-ZSM-5 photocatalyst. The XRD analysis approved the formation of the Fe-ZSM-5 and anatase TiO2 nanoparticles and Ag-doped onto surface of the Fe-ZSM-5 photocatalyst.
Discussion and

The results revealed that photocatalytic removal efficiency of Fe-ZSM-5 with Ag-doped TiO2 was significantly influenced by the solution pH. It decreased as the solution pH increased. The best performance of Ag-TiO2/Fe-ZSM-5 photocatalyst in removal of Reactive 195 (100%) was achieved at pH 3, 300 mg/L photocatalyst dose, 50 mg/L dye concentration, 75 min contact time and Ag-TiO2 with the ratio of 1. However, a minimum of dye removal efficiency of 32% was obtaimed at pH 9 under aforementioned condition. The reusability of the photocatalyst was still significant after seven times repeated cycles.