Rheological Evaluation of the Fabrication Parameters of Cellulose Acetate Butyrate Membrane on CO2/N2 Separation Performance

Abstract

The rise in emission of greenhouse gases (GHGs) mainly carbon dioxide (CO2) in recent years due to rapid development of modern civilisation, has been listed as the primary contributor to global warming.To address this global issue, membrane technology was applied and developed intensively because of its superior performance in terms of efficiency and economic advantages. In this study, the cellulose acetate butyrate (CAB) polymer was selected as the polymer matrix material since it exhibited excellent film-forming properties. In addition, the wet-phase inversion technique was adopted to synthesise the membrane based on different casting conditions. The optimum outcomes of the fabrication conditions were then characterised with the scanning electron micrograph (SEM) to determine the best CAB membrane for CO2/N2 separation. The results showed that CAB-70000 fabricated with 4 wt% of CAB polymer concentration, casting thickness of 250 µm, solvent evaporation time of 5 minutes, and 30 minutes of solvent exchange for isopropyl alcohol and n-hexane, exhibited the best gas separation performance. Further, CAB-70000 showed an average selectivity of 6.12 ± 0.09 and permeance up to 227.95 ± 0.39 GPU for CO2 and 37.28 ± 0.54 GPU for N2, respectively. In summary, this study is expected to show a detailed outline of the future direction and perspective of the novel CAB polymeric membrane that is suitable to be applied in the industry, and serves as an insight for researchers and manufacturers working in the related field of gas separation.

The Influence of Blending Different Molecular Weights of Cellulose Acetate Butyrate for CO2/N2 Separation

“…Over the decades, numerous studies and researches have been undertaken to demonstrate the advantages of the CAB membrane in the gas separation field as well as separation of CO 2 from flue gas due to its high emission since the industrial revolution. 15 Nevertheless, no studies have been conducted to evaluate the effect of blending different ratios of the CAB polymer with Mn of 12000, 70000 and 30000 with the polar acetyl group of 16-19 wt%, 12-15 wt% and 12-15 wt%, respectively, on the separation of the non-polar CO 2 /N 2 . It is believed that this work will contribute significantly towards the environment with its high permeation rate, high selectivity, energy efficient and low-cost characteristics.…”