The nanoflowers of Cu doped octahedral layered birnessite (Cu-OL-1) were prepared by a facile method of hydrothermal redox reaction between Cu(NO(3))2, Mn(NO3)(2), and KMnO4. The Cu-OL-1 samples were characterized by XRD, TEM, SEM, ICP, BET, etc. Remarkably, the Cu-OL-1 exhibits very high catalytic activity for the abatement of air pollutants (e.g. CO and benzene) with the irradiation of full solar spectrum, visible-infrared, or infrared light. The high catalytic activity of Cu-OL-1 originates from the efficient solar light-driven thermocatalysis, which is attributed to its high thermocatalytic activity and strong absorption in the whole solar spectrum region. The Cu doping in OL-1 significantly enhances its thermocatalytic activity due to a considerable enhancement in the activity of lattice oxygen in OL-1. A conceptually novel photoactivation different from the conventional photoactivation on semiconductors (e.g. TiO2) is found to enhance the activity of lattice oxygen in OL-1, thus accelerating the thermocatalysis on Cu-OL-1. We reveal the origin of the novel photoactivation by CO temperature-programmed reduction in dark and with solar light irradiation, and density functional theory (DFT) calculations. (C) 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.