Supramolecular Complexes as Photoinitiated Electron Collectors: Applications in Solar Hydrogen Production

Abstract

The urgent need to explore alternative energy sources has stimulated solar energy research globally. Solar energy that reaches the southern United States has an instantaneous maximum intensity of 1 kW m À2 and an average 24 h intensity of 250 W m À2 in a year [1]. It is a clean, abundant, and renewable energy source. Solar energy research is concentrated on its direct conversion to electricity in photovoltaic devices, conversion to heat in solar thermal devices, or conversion to chemical energy to produce fuels via artificial photosynthesis. Hydrogen has been proposed as an energy solution for the future due to its high energy content per gram (120 kJ g À1 ) and burning hydrogen results in only energy and water, having no impact on our carbon foot print. Solar Water SplittingSolar hydrogen production through water splitting is an attractive alternative energy solution for the future [1][2][3][4][5][6][7]. Solar water splitting uses light energy from the sun to convert water into hydrogen and oxygen. Water splitting is a challenging, energetically uphill process. The reactions involved in water splitting require bond breaking, bond formation and multielectron

Scavenging of Organic Pollutant and Fuel Generation through Cost-Effective and Abundantly Accessible Rust: A Theoretical Support with DFT Simulations

“…These approaches cover from sophisticated device fabrication to wide material utilization [2][3][4][5]. Photocatalysts are a large class of materials comprised of organic conjugated polymers [6], supramolecular complexes [7], and, most important, semiconducting materials [8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22], etc. Semiconducting materials are preferred photocatalysts due to their good efficiency in utilizing solar energy within the visible region to remove organic pollutants and generate green hydrogen from photoelectrochemical (PEC) water splitting [23][24][25][26][27].…”