Photocatalytic Conversion of Biomass Derived Oxygenated Compounds over Titania Supported Metal Catalyst

Fossil fuels (coal, natural gas, crude oil) play an important role as an energy source and in the production of many chemicals. The world is completely dependent on this non-renewable energy source which can be depleted in very nearby future. Carbon dioxide one of the main sources of the greenhouse gases is emitted by the use of these fossil fuels. Global energy crisis and limited supply of petroleum fuels have rekindled the worldwide focus towards development of a sustainable technology for alternative fuel production. The advantage of biomass and its derivatives are they emit no net greenhouse gases because a natural cycle is maintained in which the carbon is extracted from the atmosphere during plant growth and released during H2 production. In the class of alternative fuels H2 is considered to be ideal, clean and climate-neutral with virtually zero emissions of air pollutants and carbon dioxide. H2 is widely anticipated to be a key energy carrier within a future low carbon energy economy. Potential uses of H2 as a fuel cell feedstock abound within the transport, remote and distributed generation sectors. It can be produced by various methods like steam reforming, electrolysis etc. which are highly energy intensive. The photo catalysis to split water molecule in the presence of sunlight is an alternative process of production of H2. In this process, oxygenated compound (known as sacrificing agent) which act as a hole scavengers is used as feedstock. These sacrificing agents are derived from biomass and the process is environmental friendly and low cost. Photo catalytic reactions were carried out in an outer-irradiation photo reactor using Ni, Cu, Cr, V, Mn, Co supported Titania as catalyst at ambient temperature. The Mesoporous Titania was synthesized using templating technique. The metal supported Mesoporous Titania and P25 Titania catalysts with different loadings were prepared using wet impregnation method. The prepared catalysts were characterized using XRD, BET, Pulse chemisorption, and TPR, FTIR, UV-VIS-NIR, TGA techniques