Evaluation of several commercial polymers as support for TiO2 in photocatalytic applications

Abstract

This work is aimed to select the best synthetic polymers available in the market with high transmittance in the TiO2 activation range that can be coated with the semiconductor and withstand the photocatalytic oxidation conditions.

Among eleven commercial organic polymers with different additives and processing techniques, only polypropylene, polystyrene, sheet moulding processed poly (methyl methacrylate) and rigid polyvinyl chloride presented transmittances higher than 80% at 360 nm , which allows irradiation there through. The selected polymers were coated without a calcination step with anatase-TiO2 obtained by sol-gel. Their weathering was studied during 150 days of exposure to solar radiation, with and without the TiO2 layer. It was observed that only poly (methyl methacrylate) retains the titania and the good optical and mechanical properties after the natural weathering, and thus is the best candidate for immobilization of TiO2 for air photocatalytic treatment applications.