Emerging semiconductors and metal-organic-compounds-related photocatalysts for sustainable hydrogen peroxide production

As a versatile raw material, hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) is extensively employed in chemicals synthesis, medical disinfection, textile industry, and environmental remediation fields. H2O2 generation through a photocatalytic route has attracted increasing interest. Tremendous progress and achievements have been made over the past decades in photocatalytic H2O2 production. Herein, we critically review the state-of-the art developments on various photocatalysts, including carbon nitride, titania, bismuth, sulfide, carbon, and metal-organic-compound-related materials, for the highly efficient light-driven H2O2 synthesis. Significantly, these materials show tunable morphology, micro-nanostructure, surface chemistry, and electronic band-gap structure characters for sufficient light harvesting, rapid hole-electron pairs separation and transfer, and favorable reactants adsorption as well as facilitated products desorption, thus delivering great activity for efficient light-driven H2O2 production. The specific challenges and opportunities related to photocatalytic materials discovery and development that will emerge from this important field are discussed.