SnO2-based materials for pesticide degradation

This study presents the results of the degradation of the pesticide atrazine using electrochemical and photo-assisted electrochemical degradation techniques using SnO2-containing electrode of nominal composition electrodes of composition Ti/RuXSn1−XO2 (where X = 0.10, 0.15, 0.20, 0.25 and 0.30). The materials were characterized ex situ and in situ in order to correlate the observed atrazine removal rates with electrode morphology/composition. The results obtained demonstrate the effectiveness of the photo-assisted electrochemical degradation. Using purely electrochemical methods the rate of atrazine removal is almost zero at all the electrodes studied. However, the application of photo-assisted degradation results in almost complete atrazine removal in 1 h of electrolysis. The efficiency of atrazine degradation does not seem to be greatly affected by the electrode material or by SnO2 content, but the overall COD removal is dependent on the SnO2 content. Overall, the SnO2-containing electrodes do not reach the level of COD removal (maximum ∼21%) seen for the Ti/Ru0.3Ti0.7O2 electrode. An interesting correlation between the morphology factor (φ) and chemical oxygen demand removal is observed.