Treating Wastewater powered by Sunlight - It is a Reality!

Thanks to Assoc Prof Olivier Lefebvre (with his research team at NERI and Centre for Water Research, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, NUS), Assist Prof Hugo Olvera-Vargas from Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (IER-UNAM) and Prof Hyacinthe Randriamahazaka from Université Paris Cité, this once seen only in science fiction story has been made into a reality.

Imagine the sun's energy transformed into a force for good, capable of purifying our environment. That's precisely what this research explores.

Leveraging on the revolutionary hybrid photoelectrodes with Carbon Quantum Dots (CQDs) and Titanium Dioxide (TiO₂), an extraordinary partnership is harnessing the full potential of sunlight to degrade pollutants such as phenol (used as a model pollutant in the study) in the wastewater.

The journey has moved beyond lab experiments. The team has ventured into the real world, testing the TiO₂-CQD photoanode in the wastewater treatment sector, specifically with wastewater from membrane fabrication. The results were stunning, demonstrating the photoelectrocatalytic efficiency under solar radiation. In just 8 hours, a remarkable 93% mineralization was achieved! Mineralization refers to the pollution being entirely removed from the wastewater and not simply converted into smaller and potentially still harmful contaminants.

This isn't just another scientific discovery; it's a leap towards greener pollution control technology.

Please refer to the article for more details:
“Hybrid TiO₂/Carbon quantum dots heterojunction photoanodes for solar photoelectrocatalytic wastewater treatment” published in Chemosphere, 341, Nov 2023, 140077
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chemosphere.2023.140077