Solar hydrogen generation via photocatalytic water splitting represents an attractive strategy to address the global energy crisis and environmental pollution issues. CdS-based photocatalysts, including nanosized CdS powder, CdS-based solid solutions and CdS quantum dots, have attracted significant attention for photocatalytic H2 production due to their unique advantages, including strong visible light absorption capacity, suitable band edge levels and excellent electronic charge transfer. This review focuses on recent advances in material design and technological aspects of CdS-based photocatalysts for applications in photocatalytic H2 production. A brief overview of basic concepts and principles of photocatalytic water splitting was given in the Introduction section, followed by the basic properties of CdS. Then, the utilization of three main types of CdS-based semiconductor photocatalysts for solar H2 generation is introduced, and those important factors which can determine the photocatalytic performance were also discussed in detail. Special consideration has been given to the effect of morphology, interfacial junctions, exposing facet and cocatalysts on the photocatalytic performance of CdS-based photocatalysts. Finally, a roadmap of possible future directions to further explore the research field of CdS-based photocatalysts for solar H2 generation is also discussed.

Cadmium sulfide-based nanomaterials for photocatalytic hydrogen production

The use of solar energy to catalyze the photo-driven processes has attracted tremendous attention from the scientific community because of its great potential to address energy and environmental is...

Perovskite Oxide Based Materials for Energy and Environment-Oriented Photocatalysis

A review on 2D MoS2 cocatalysts in photocatalytic H2 production

Photocatalytic water splitting is a sustainable technology for the production of clean fuel in terms of hydrogen (H2). In the present study, hydrogen (H2) production efficiency of three promising photocatalysts (titania (TiO2-P25), graphitic carbon nitride (g-C3N4), and cadmium sulfide (CdS)) was evaluated in detail using various sacrificial agents. The effect of most commonly used sacrificial agents in the recent years, such as methanol, ethanol, isopropanol, ethylene glycol, glycerol, lactic acid, glucose, sodium sulfide, sodium sulfite, sodium sulfide/sodium sulfite mixture, and triethanolamine, were evaluated on TiO2-P25, g-C3N4, and CdS. H2 production experiments were carried out under simulated solar light irradiation in an immersion type photo-reactor. All the experiments were performed without any noble metal co-catalyst. Moreover, photolysis experiments were executed to study the H2 generation in the absence of a catalyst. The results were discussed specifically in terms of chemical reactions, pH of the reaction medium, hydroxyl groups, alpha hydrogen, and carbon chain length of sacrificial agents. The results revealed that glucose and glycerol are the most suitable sacrificial agents for an oxide photocatalyst. Triethanolamine is the ideal sacrificial agent for carbon and sulfide photocatalyst. A remarkable amount of H2 was produced from the photolysis of sodium sulfide and sodium sulfide/sodium sulfite mixture without any photocatalyst. The findings of this study would be highly beneficial for the selection of sacrificial agents for a particular photocatalyst.

Wan-Kuen Jo

Papers

Reduced graphene oxide as an efficient support for CdS-MoS2 heterostructures for enhanced photocatalytic H2 evolution

Photodeposited-metal/CdS/ZnO heterostructures for solar photocatalytic hydrogen production under different conditions

Application of a photostable silver-assisted Z-scheme NiTiO3 nanorod/g-C3N4 nanocomposite for efficient hydrogen generation