Novel nanohybrid iron (II/III) phthalocyanine-based carbon nanotubes as catalysts for organic pollutant removal: process optimization by chemometric approach.

In the present study, two iron phthalocyanine (FePc)-based nanocatalysts were synthesized and fully characterized. The carbon nanotubes (CNT) functionalized in an easy way with either Fe(II)Pc or Fe(III)Pc exhibit a very good catalytical activity. The activity in real wastewater effluent was comparable with the activity in distilled water. The procedure of modeling and optimizing with the assistance of chemometrics, utilizing design of experiments (DOE) and response surface methodology (RSM), revealed the conditions of optimum for decaying Reactive Yellow 84 on the nanocatalysts FePc_CNT. These optimal conditions included a catalyst dose of 1.70 g/L and an initial concentration (C0) of 20.0 mg/L. Under the indicated optimal conditions, the experimental findings verified that the removal efficiency was equal to Y = 98.92%, representing the highest observed value in this study. Under UVA light, after only 15 min of reaction, over 94% of dye was removed using both catalysts. The reuse experiments show that the activity of both nanohybrid material based on FePc-CNT slightly decreases over four consecutive runs. The quenching experiments show that RY84 was removed through radical pathways (O2•- and •OH) as well as non-radical pathways (1O2 and direct electron transfer).