Nanocomposite Membranes for Gas Separation

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Nanocomposite Membranes for Gas Separation

• Lei Shao and May-Britt Hägg
• MEMFO Research Group
• Department  of Chemical Engineering/NTNU

French Norwegian CO2 Seminar 22nd and 23rd
November 2007
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The MEMFO Research Group
(http//www.chemeng.ntnu.no/memfo)

• MEMFO is the membrane research group in the
  Department of Chemical Engineering at Norwegian
  University of Science and Technology (NTNU).
• The RD work of the Membrane research group can
  be roughly divided into the following activities
  
• - Membranes for (industrial) gas applications
  (e.g. CO2, CH4, H2, VOC,Cl2, SF6)
• - Material technology - membrane development
• - Membranes for renewable energy (biogas, H2)
• - Design of environmental friendly processes
• - Simulation optimization of (integrated)
  membrane processes
• - Membranes in bioprocessing biodiesel and
  bioethanol

Group Members Professor May-Britt Hägg Head
of group
Senior researcher Dr. Taek-Joong Kim
Polymer FSC-membranes Postdoc Arne Lindbråthen
Glass membranes
Senior researcher Tom-Nils Nilsen
Polymer synthesis Postdoc Jon A. Lie
Carbon membranes
Varying number MSc-students every year
Postdoc Edel Sheridan Spinning of
hollow fibers
Postdoc Per-Erik Larsson Modeling and
Simulations PhD student David Grainger Carbon
membranes and simulations PhD student Tone
Borge Mixed matrix membranes
PhD student Lei Shao Mixed matrix
membranes PhD student Marius Sandru
Polymeric FSC-membranes PhD student Liyuan Deng
Blend polymeric membranes PhD sdudent
Xuezhong He Spinning of hollow fibers
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High Solubility Reverse Selective Polymers
Properties (1) High free volume FFV (2)
High permeability P (3) Exhibit low ideal
gas selectivity (4) To be tailored for reverse
selectivity
Physical Aging
- PTMSP exhibits substantial physical aging
(loosing performance) if it is not stabilized.
- PTMSP is also soluble in some organic
compounds, leading to potential dissolution of
the membrane in process stream where its
separation properties are of greatest interest.
To promote the use of PTMSP, the chemical and
physical stability needs to be improved We do
it by crosslinking!
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Crosslinking and Stabilization of Nanocomposites
for Gas Separations

• HFBAA
• (2wt)

FS fumed silica
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• Conclusions
• - The chemical stability of PTMSP is strongly
  enhanced using bis azide HFBAA as a crosslinker.
• After crosslinking, the PTMSP membranes
  were insoluble in good solvents such as toluene
  and cyclohexane.
• - Compared to the pure PTMSP membrane, the
  permeability of the crosslinked membrane is
  initially reduced for all gases tested due to the
  crosslinking. By adding nanoparticles fumed
  silica (FS), the permeability is again increased.
  The selectivities of CO2/N2, CO2/CH4, O2/N2,
  H2/N2 and H2/CH4 increased with increasing amount
  of crosslinker.
• - Crosslinking is successful in maintaining
  the permeability and selectivity of PTMSP
  membranes and PTMSP/silica nanocomposites over
  time.

Acknowledgement
The work is funded by the Norwegian Research
Council (NFR) through the Nanomat-program
Thank you for your attention!
Welcome to visit us at MEMFO at NTNU
Trondheim Norway! (http//www.chemeng.ntnu.no/me
mfo)