Use of Sodium Lauryl Sulphate as a Surfactant in a Photogalvanic Cell for Solar Energy Conversion and Storage: A Sodium Lauryl Sulphate-Methylene Blue-Mannose System

Abstract

Sodium lauryl sulphate is used as a surfactant with methylene blue as a photosensitizer and Mannose as a reductant for enhancement of the performance of the photogalvanic cell for its commercial viability. The generated photopotential and photocurrent were 809.0 mV and 80.0 μA, respectively. The effect of various parameters, such as concentrations of photosensitizer, reductant, and surfactant; variation of pH; diffusion path length; electrode area; and light intensity, were observed. The storage capacity of the photogalvanic cell was found to be 48.0 min in the dark. Current-voltage characteristics, fill factor, and conversion efficiency of the cell have been studied and a tentative mechanism has also been proposed for the generation of photocurrent in the photogalvanic cell. All observed performances of the system were found to be higher in the presence of surfactant.

Keywords:

• conversion efficiency
• mannose
• methylene blue
• photogalvanic cell
• sodium lauryl sulphate
• storage capacity

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Erratum

Notes

^a [NaLS] = 6.00 × 10⁻³ M; [MB] = 3.20 × 10⁻⁵ M; [Mannose] = 1.80 × 10⁻³ M; pH = 12.90; Light intensity = 10.4 mW cm⁻²; Temperature = 303 K.

^b [MB] = 3.92 × 10⁻⁵ M; [Mannose] = 1.84 × 10⁻³ M; pH = 13.03; Light intensity = 10.4 mW cm⁻²; Temperature = 303 K.