Abstract—Photocatalytic water splitting is an alternative method for hydrogen production. Cadmium zinc sulfide is a photocatalyst active under visible light that is effective for hydrogen generation in the presence of sulfide and sulfite as sacrificial reagents. Design of photocatalytic reactors for such a system requires a kinetic model of the photocatalytic reaction. In this study, the effect of catalyst loading, sulfide and sulfite concentration, and incident light intensity on the rate of hydrogen production using a cadmium zinc sulfide catalyst suspended in an externally irradiated batch reactor was investigated. The variation of the local volumetric rate of photon absorption (LVRPA) in the batch reactor was taken into account by modeling the reactor radiation field using the two-flux theory of Kubelka and Munk. A kinetic model reflecting the influence of sacrificial reagent concentrations and the LVRPA was developed and fit to the experimental data. The model parameters obtained are independent of irradiation form and reactor geometry and may thus be used for the design and scale-up of photocatalytic reactors.
Index Terms—Cadmium zinc sulfide, intrinsic kinetic modeling, photocatalytic hydrogen production, water splitting.
H. M. G. Tambago and R. L. de Leon are with the Department of Chemical Engineering, University of the Philippines, Diliman, 1108 Quezon City, Philippines (e-mail: hyacinth.tambago@coe.upd.edu.ph, rldeleon@upd.edu.ph).
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Cite: Hyacinth Mae G. Tambago and Rizalinda L. de Leon, "Intrinsic Kinetic Modeling of Hydrogen Production by Photocatalytic Water Splitting Using Cadmium Zinc Sulfide Catalyst," International Journal of Chemical Engineering and Applications vol. 6, no. 4, pp. 220-227, 2015.
