Electro-oxidation of phenol on zeolite/graphite composite electrodes: Part 2. Influence of zeolite type and composition

In this work, the electro-oxidation of phenol was investigated by cyclic voltammetry using composite electrodes built with graphite and different types of zeolites; porous and non-porous silica were also used for comparison purposes. In part 1 of this series it was shown that a NaY/graphite composite electrode has a very good response for phenol oxidation. In this work the influence of the nature and structure of the zeolite component by using different zeolites, such as Y, Beta, ZSM5, X and A, both in their sodium and protonic forms was analysed.Among all the zeolites that were used in this study, NaY with a Si/Al ratio of 2.5 seems to produce the best results for the electrochemical oxidation of phenol, by producing a larger current and a lower oxidation potential. It was also concluded that sodium zeolites consistently show better results than acidic ones and that the increase in hydrophobicity is not advantageous either.

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