Photoreforming of food waste into value-added products over visible-light-absorbing catalysts

Approximately 1.3 billion tons of food waste are generated each year, resulting in societal, economic and environmental repercussions across the globe. While efforts to minimise losses and redistribute resources are underway, vast quantities of food waste must still be managed. Photoreforming offers...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Green chemistry : an international journal and green chemistry resource : GC 2020-05, Vol.22 (1), p.3262-3271
Main Authors: Uekert, Taylor, Dorchies, Florian, Pichler, Christian M, Reisner, Erwin
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Cadmium sulfide
Carbohydrates
Carbon
Carbon footprint
Carbon nitride
Catalysts
Electromagnetic absorption
Environmental impact
Fats
Food
Food production
Food waste
Green chemistry
pH effects
Quantum dots
Titanium dioxide
Waste management
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Summary:Approximately 1.3 billion tons of food waste are generated each year, resulting in societal, economic and environmental repercussions across the globe. While efforts to minimise losses and redistribute resources are underway, vast quantities of food waste must still be managed. Photoreforming offers a simple, sunlight-driven method for transforming food waste into valuable chemicals and clean H 2 fuel, but the minimal previous research on this topic relied on expensive and UV-absorbing catalysts. Here, we utilise two precious-metal-free and visible-light-driven photocatalytic systems (CdS quantum dots in alkaline solution and carbon nitride with co-catalyst Ni 2 P under pH neutral conditions) to photoreform a variety of carbohydrates, fats, proteins and real-world mixed wastes into H 2 and organic products such as formate. CdS offers higher efficiencies in alkaline media than a benchmark TiO 2 |RuO 2 -Pt catalyst, but carbon footprint calculations suggest that photoreforming with carbon nitride|Ni 2 P in pH neutral H 2 O offers a more sustainable route towards real-world application. Food and mixed wastes are converted into H 2 and organics over CdS and carbon nitride photocatalysts.
ISSN:1463-9262
1463-9270
DOI:10.1039/d0gc01240h