Non-Negligible Oxygen Atoms in Transition Metal Phosphides: Research on the Role of Oxygen in Hydrodechlorination

Environmental pressure gives potential for the application of transition metal phosphides (TMPs), which serve as efficient degradation catalysts. Although various efforts are advocated to obtain high activity, it is still difficult for phosphides to exhibit cycle performance in hydrodechlorination (HDC), limiting their practical development. By linking the changes in the oxidation state of MoP before and after HDC with its catalytic performance, the Mo–P–O bond is found to be the active catalytic site, not only promoting electron transfer but also forming the defect-rich structure. Based on this, H2O2-treated MoP after HDC reached a performance of 19.9%, and the activity could be restored after multiple cycle reactions, while the untreated one still had poor performance, demonstrating that carrying out the H2O2 treatment process can realize the recycling of MoP, which is of importance for industrial application of catalysts.