Preparation of BiVO4/BiOCl heterojunction photocatalyst by in-situ transformation method for norfloxacin photocatalytic degradation

•Preparation of a BiVO4-BiOCl composite photocatalyst by ion exchange method.•Novel mesoporous spindle like BiVO4/nanosheet BiOCl composited nanostructure.•Great photocatalysis performance for norfloxacin degradation.•Improving the charge separation efficiency and transfer capacity.

In this study, we employed an in-situ transformation method to prepared a mesoporous spindle like BiVO4/nanosheet BiOCl composite photocatalyst. The nanostructure and content of 2-D BiOCl could be facilely tuned by controlling the concentration of Cl− ions in the reaction solution. The as-prepared BiVO4-BiOCl photocatalyst showed an excellent photocatalytic norfloxacin degradation performance, and removed it in 1 h almost completely. Further research results indicated that a well-defined p-n heterojunction interface has been formed between BiVO4 and BiOCl, to enhance the separation efficiency of photogenerated carriers. In addition, after the nanosheets BiOCl interlaced with the mesoporous BiVO4 spindles, since the 2-D structure of the former, the charge transfer capacity of the composite would be improved to prolong the lifetime of the photoinduced carriers.