High-performance Ti/BDD electrodes for pollutant oxidation

Deposition of stable boron-doped diamond (BDD) films on Ti substrates is believed to be very difficult. In the present study, the stability of Ti/BDD electrodes has been significantly improved by using an organic additive, CH2-(OCH3)2. The improved electrodes had service lives of 175-264 h under accelerated life test conditions, which are 2.3-3.0 times longer than the service lives of electrodes prepared with the conventional H2 + CH4 mixture. Raman spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction (XRD), and scanning electron microscopy (SEM) examinations demonstrated that the films had well-defined diamond features. The current efficiency (CE) obtained on Ti/BDD was 46.9-78.5% in oxidizing acetic acid, maleic acid, phenol, and dyes, which is 1.6-4.3-fold higher than that obtained on the typical Ti/ Sb2O5-SnO2 electrode. We used a Ti/BDD electrode prepared with H2 + CH4+ CH2(OCH3)2 for over 300 h; its activity remained superior. The successful development of stable and active Ti/BDD electrodes significantly increases the feasibility of industrial applications of anodic oxidation in wastewater treatment.