Efficient construction of S-scheme heterojunctions for photocatalytic hydrogen production

In the context of escalating demands for clean energy, photocatalytic hydrogen production has emerged as a sustainable approach to address shortages of fossil fuels and environmental pollution. In this study, we synthesized CdS nanorods and CoCo-PBA nanoparticles using a simple hot-solvent method, successfully constructing an efficient and stable composite photocatalyst by integrating these two materials. The CdS/CoCo-PBA composite demonstrated significantly enhanced photocatalytic performance compared to pure CdS and CoCo-PBA. In the composite catalyst CSCo-15, hydrogen production reached an impressive 765.68 μmol after 4 hours of reaction, which is 2.54 times greater than that of the pure CdS photocatalyst. This remarkable stability is attributed to the introduction of CoCo-PBA, which facilitates effective interfacial contact with CdS, thereby promoting the formation of S-scheme heterojunctions. This enhanced interface accelerates the transfer of photogenerated charges between the semiconductors, thereby improving hydrogen production efficiency. The formation of the S-scheme heterojunction was further confirmed by in situ XPS experiments. This study proposes a novel and straightforward approach to constructing efficient S-scheme heterojunctions, offering novel insights for the design and synthesis of metal–organic frameworks and semiconductor composites derived from Prussian blue.