Simultaneous enhancement of chlorine evolution and ozone production by tin-platinum co-doped TiO2-RuO2/Ti electrodes for effective water purification

TiRuSnPt electrodes with nanoporous structure were fabricated. • Sn Pt co-doping enhances TiRu for dual CER and EOP functionality. • TiRuSnPt electrodes efficiently degrades organics mainly via in-situ generated O 3 and 1 O 2 . • 100% BPA degradation maintains over 240 h under periodic polarity reversal. The electrochemical generation of free chlorine and ozone for the degradation of organic pollutants in water holds broad application prospects. While traditional TiO 2 -RuO 2 /Ti (TiRu) electrodes exhibit favorable chlorine evolution performance in chloride-containing systems, their oxidation capability is limited under chloride-free or low-chloride conditions. To extend the applicability of electrodes in various water matrices, this study developed a TiRuSnPt electrode with simultaneously enhanced electrochemical chlorine evolution (CER) and electrochemical ozone production (EOP) via a tin‑platinum co-doping on TiRu strategy. The TiRuSnPt electrode achieves excellent CER activity that exhibits a Faradaic efficiency (FE) of 67% under low-chloride conditions at 50 mM Cl − . Moreover, the incorporation of tin and platinum enhances the EOP capability of TiRu, overcoming the limitations of conventional TiRu in chloride-free systems for water purification. In chloride-free electrolytes, the ozone and reactive oxygen species generated by TiRuSnPt can efficiently degrade various organic pollutants, such as bisphenol A (BPA) that achieving 99.7% removal within 6 min. TiRuSnPt exhibited high stability under polarity reversal conditions, that can maintain 100% BPA removal and over 80% of total organic carbon removal in a continuous BPA degradation system for more than 240 h. The high stability was due to tin‑platinum co-doping on TiRu, of which the accelerated lifetime increases by 2.6 times for TiRuSnPt compared to TiRu. This work provides a feasible strategy for developing multifunctional TiRuSnPt electrodes with high-efficiency chlorine evolution and ozone production capabilities, thereby broadening their application scopes in water treatment. Download: Download high-res image (159KB) Download: Download full-size image