Degradation of pollutants in solid and gas states using waterborne acrylic nanocomposite paints

In this study, TiO2/SiO2 nanoparticles were synthesized using titanium tetraisopropoxide and tetraethoxysilane in a two-step sol-gel route. FTIR, XRD, UV–Vis, and XPS techniques were used to characterize the synthesized nanoparticles. Fe-SEM was utilized to evaluate the particle size of the synthesized nanoparticles (30.35 ± 4.52 nm). Photo-degradation of rhodamine B (Rh.B) as a solid pollutant model and NO2 as a typical gaseous pollutant was assessed on the surface of the waterborne-acrylic coatings containing TiO2/SiO2 nanoparticles (TSC.La) under direct sunlight irradiation and accelerated weathering conditions and the results were compared with a P25–TiO2 nanoparticle (UT.La) embedded coating samples. To evaluate the degradation of Rh.B, color coordinates (L*a*b*) were measured, while the degradation of NO2 was determined in a batch-designed photocatalytic reactor by measuring the reduction in gas concentration. For the TSC.La-sample exposed to accelerated weathering conditions, the changes in a* parameter (Δa*) were about 60%, which was 44 times greater than the changes in this parameter for the sample exposed to sunlight. The surface morphology of the exposed samples to the accelerated weathering conditions was evaluated using AFM and BET measurements. The AFM results indicated that TiO2/SiO2 nanoparticles lead to less surface degradation of the paints compared to the commercial TiO2 nanoparticles. NO2 concentration decreased steadily in the reactor from 30 to 27 ppm, at an RH%