Facile synthesis of bimetallic ACF/CC@FeOCl-Cu composite cathode for efficient degradation of sulfamethoxazole at neutral pH by a flow-through heterogeneous electro-Fenton process.

Flow-through heterogeneous electro-Fenton (FHEF) process shows a broad prospect for refractory organic pollutants removal. However, maintaining a long-term service life of higher catalytic cathode is crucial for the development of cathode materials, especially for iron-functionalized cathode operated under harsh conditions. In this study, a novel bimetallic CC@FeOCl-Cu composite was synthesized through one-step calcination, coupled with a series of microstructure characterization methodology, including XRD, SEM-EDS, XPS, and FTIR. The superior catalytic activity of CC@FeOCl-Cu could be ascribed to Fe-Cu synergy and better dispersion of FeOCl nanosheets. With the optimal Cu:Fe ratio of 1:60, the bifunctional ACF/CC@FeOCl-Cu cathode was employed in FHEF process, exhibiting an outstanding performance for sulfamethoxazole (SMX) removal over a wide pH range (3.0-9.0). Comparison of experimental results indicated that the ACF/CC@FeOCl-Cu-FHEF process showed higher performance than ACF/CC@FeOCl-FHEF and homogeneous EF processes. The average SMX removal efficiency was 98% and TOC removal efficiency was more than 57% even after 10 cycles. Radical quenching experiments and electron spin resonance test confirmed that

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Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.