Solvothermal synthesis of BiOCl nanoplates with excellent photocatalytic activity for dye degradation

Abstract

A two-phased solvothermal method was employed to synthesize BiOCl nanoplates using Bi(NO3)3·5H2O, sodium oleate and KCl as the starting materials. The phases, morphology and optical property of the products were characterized by X-ray powder diffraction (XRD), transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and UV-vis diffuse reflectance spectroscopy (DRS). XRD and TEM images showed that the BiOCl nanoplates have a tetragonal phase with the lateral length of 50–100 nm. DRS exhibited that the obtained BiOCl samples have great absorption in the ultraviolet light range. Methyl orange (MO) and Rhodamine B (RhB) were used as the target degradation to assess the photocatalytic properties of the samples. Under UV irradiation, the degradation rate of MO and RhB was reached to 96.3 % and 97.7 % within 30 min. The results indicated that the BiOCl nanoplates have great potential applications in dye degradation.