High photocatalytic activity of hydrogen production from water over Fe doped and Ag deposited anatase TiO2 catalyst synthesized by solvothermal method

Abstract Metallic Ag deposited and Fe 3+ ions doped anatase TiO 2 nanoparticles were successfully synthesized by one-step solvothermal method with using tetrabutyl titanate as precursor and ethanol as solvent. All prepared TiO 2 samples were single anatase phase through XRD and Raman spectroscopy analysis. Compared with pure TiO 2 , Fe doped and Ag deposited TiO 2 showed higher visible light absorption activity and lower electron–hole pair recombination rate. In all TiO 2 samples, 4.5% Fe–4.5% Ag/TiO 2 displayed the highest absorption intensity of visible light and lowest recombination rate of electron–hole pairs, its absorption wavelength edge moved remarkably with a red shift to 610 nm. Based on XPS and TEM analysis, Fe 3+ located in the TiO 2 lattice and metallic Ag particles deposited on the surface of it were detected, the particle sizes of Ag were about 2–3 nm. Average maximum H 2 production rate through water splitting was 515.45 μmol h −1 g cat - 1 with using 4.5% Fe–4.5% Ag/TiO 2 as catalyst (a measured time of 6 h, visible light irradiation, λ  > 400 nm). At last, the mechanism of H 2 production by water splitting under visible light irradiation was also proposed.