November 22, 2024
Seyed Abdollatif Hashemifard

Seyed Abdollatif Hashemifard

Academic Rank: Associate professor
Address: .
Degree: Ph.D in مهندسی شیمی
Phone: 09177755574
Faculty: Faculty of Petroleum, Gas and Petrochemical Engineering

Research

Title Experimental study on the performance and long-term stability ofPVDF/montmorillonite hollow fiber mixed matrix membranesfor CO2separation process
Type Article
Keywords
Journal International Journal of Greenhouse Gas Control
DOI
Researchers A. F. Ismail (Second researcher) , Seyed Abdollatif Hashemifard (Third researcher) ,

Abstract

Porous asymmetric polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF)/montmorillonite (MMT) hollow fiber mixed matrixmembranes (MMMs) with different nano-clay loadings were prepared via wet phase inversion techniqueand was used for membrane contactor. The fabricated MMMs were characterized in terms of morphol-ogy, structure, gas permeability, wetting resistance and mechanical stability. From morphology pointof view, the fabricated membranes had a finger-like/sponge-like structure in the middle layer with avery porous thin outer skin layer and an inner skinless sponge-like structure. Atomic force microscopy(AFM) revealed an increase in surface roughness with increasing MMT loading. From gas permeationtest, the surface porosity of the MMMs was higher than the plain PVDF membrane and the mean poresize of the membranes was small (34–22 nm) and decreased slightly at 5 wt.% MMT loading. A significantimprovement in LEPw and hydrophobicity caused the prepared MMMs to show high wetting resistances.Mechanical stability test of membranes demonstrated an increase in stress at break and collapsing pres-sure with a slight loss in elongation with clay loading. CO2absorption tests with water as absorbentshowed that the absorption rate of the MMMs was higher than the plain membrane and increased withMMT loading. For example, at MMT loading of 5 wt.% and absorbent flow rate of 0.5 m s?1, the absorp-tion flux was 1.89 × 10?3mol m?2s?1that was 48.7% higher than the plain PVDF membrane. Moreover,the absorption rate of the best fabricated MMM was higher than the commercial PVDF membrane. Along-term contactor test of this membrane over 350 h showed that wetting did not take place and theabsorption flux remained almost constant. It was concluded that, due to the higher surface hydropho-bicity, wetting resistance and performance, MMMs can be a promising candidate to be used in contactorapplications.