Photocatalytic degradation of atenolol in aqueous suspension of new recyclable catalysts based on titanium dioxide

Photocatalytic degradation of atenolol in aqueous suspensions using specifically synthetized mesoporous based TiO2 materials as photocatalysts under UVC (254 nm) irradiation was investigated. A batch reactor and a UV lamp 16 W power were used to test the ATL removal with several initial concentrations of ATL (4.5 − 30 mg/L) and four synthetized TiO2 photocatalysts, characterized by different BET surface areas and average pore sizes. Moreover, the effect of solution pH (4.8 − 9.0) and of the oxygen presence were investigated. The performances of the synthetized photocatalysts were compared with commercial Degussa P25. The atenolol degradation was studied using different concentration of catalyst (50 and 1000 mg/L) showing a maximum removal efficiency of 65%. Although the new catalysts showed a lower efficiency when compared to commercial P25, they can be easily recovered from water being in the form of micro-aggregate, and then reused without remarkable changes. The experimental data were fitted using a pseudo first order kinetic model.