New trends on photoelectrocatalysis (PEC): nanomaterials, wastewater treatment and hydrogen generation

The need for novel water treatment technologies has been recently recognised as concerning contaminants (organics and pathogens) are resilient to standard technologies. Advanced oxidation processes degrade organics inactivate microorganisms via generated reactive oxygen species (ROS). Among them, heterogeneous photocatalysis may have reduced efficiency due to, fast electron-hole pair recombination in the photoexcited semiconductor effective surface area of immobilised photocatalysts. To overcome these, process can be electrically assisted by using an external bias, conductive support photocatalyst connected a counter electrode, this is known photoelectrocatalysis (PEC). Compared photocatalysis, PEC increases generation ROS prevention charge between photogenerated pairs thanks electrical bias applied. This review presents recent trends, challenges, nanomaterials different applications (degradation organic pollutants , disinfection hydrogen from wastewater).