An investigation on polymeric blend mixed matrix membranes of polyethersulfone/polyvinyl acetate/carbon molecular sieve for CO₂/Ch₄ separation

Abstract

Polymeric membranes have been vastly used for gas separation purposes however they have an upper-bound trade off problem which is the reason why this research work is focusing on inorganic filler added to polymer blend membranes to enhance the selectivity and permeability of the resulted membranes. Different percentages (5, 10 and 15 wt.%) of carbon molecular sieve (CMS) were added to a blend of polyethersulfone/polyvinyl acetate (PES/PVAc) (90/10) to produce polymeric blend mixed matrix membranes (PB3M) by solvent evaporation method. These membranes were characterized by field emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM) to find out the membrane morphology and then their gas separation performance was assessed using high purity CO2 and CH4 gases. Addition of CMS to the blend of this glassy and rubbery polymer, increased the CO2/CH4 selectivity and CO2 permeability of the resulted PB3Ms. The highest selectivity which was 43.26 was achieved at 10 bar and at room temperature by adding 15% CMS to the polymer blend membrane.

Keywords: Mixed Matrix membrane; polyvinyl acetate; polyethersulfone; carbon molecular
sieve