Visible light driven V-doped TiO2 photocatalyst and its photooxidation of ethanol

A vanadium-doped, supported TiO2 photocatalyst is presented which is quite active using visible (396-450 nm) light. The oxidation of ethanol over this catalyst was studied using C-13 solid-state NMR methods that demonstrated that this catalyst photooxidizes ethanol to produce mostly carbon dioxide with small amounts of acetaldehyde, formic acid, and carbon monoxide under visible irradiation. Under UV irradiation, the catalyst has comparable activity and product distribution as a similarly prepared TiO2 thin-film monolayer catalyst.