Boron doped diamond (BDD) electrode: a new solution for wastewater treatment

With the rapid development of society, the amount of sewage discharge from various industries is increasing day by day, and the composition of pollutants is also becoming increasingly complex. How to treat these sewage has become a huge challenge faced by all humanity. The emergence of boron doped diamond (BDD) electrodes provides a new solution for wastewater treatment.

The intrinsic resistance of diamond can reach 1016 Ω∙ cm, making it an excellent insulating material that limits its potential in electrochemical applications. By precisely controlling the doping of boron atoms, the conductivity of diamond can be significantly improved, transforming it into a semiconductor and even exhibiting superconducting properties under certain conditions.

At present, commonly used sewage treatment methods include physical, chemical, and biochemical methods. However, traditional treatment methods often fail to effectively degrade wastewater when faced with complex pollutant components, high pollutant concentrations, and biological toxicity. Meanwhile, traditional sewage treatment methods also face problems such as long treatment cycles, high equipment investment, and the introduction of other pollutants.

Electrochemical advanced oxidation processes (EAOP), as a new type of wastewater treatment process, are considered a highly promising wastewater treatment process due to their advantages of simple equipment, easy operation, convenient control, wide applicability, and no need to add chemical reagents.

The core of electrochemical advanced oxidation technology lies in the anode material. Common anode materials include graphite electrodes, metal electrodes (Cu, Pb, etc.), metal oxide electrodes (MnO2, RuO2, NiO, etc.), and boron doped diamond (BDD) electrodes. Among them, BDD electrode has the widest electrochemical window (up to 4.5V), extremely high oxygen evolution potential (up to 2.8V), excellent chemical stability, and can operate continuously and stably for a long time in strong acid, strong alkali, and high salt environments. It has broad application prospects in wastewater treatment and has become a research hotspot in recent years. 

BDD is a diamond material in which a portion of carbon atoms are replaced by boron atoms. When boron atoms are doped into diamond, it transforms from an insulator to a semiconductor. This is because boron atoms enter the diamond lattice and generate hole carriers, making them hole type semiconductors or P-type semiconductors. As the boron doping concentration increases, the hole concentration and carrier concentration in diamond also increase, resulting in improved conductivity. But when the concentration of boron atoms in diamond is too high, it will damage the structure of diamond, leading to a significant decrease in its conductivity. Under electrification conditions, the surface of BDD will directly or indirectly oxidize organic matter in water into non-toxic and harmless inorganic substances.

CSMH is committed to the research and production of diamond materials, with core products including diamond heat sinks, diamond wafers, diamond windows, diamond heterojunction integrated composite substrates, etc. Among them, boron doped diamond (BDD) electrodes provide an advanced solution in the field of wastewater treatment, and are currently applied in wastewater treatment such as dyes, papermaking, leather making, pesticides, pharmaceuticals, petrochemicals, and wine making.