The Effect of Additive on Cellulose Acetate Membrane From Coconut Sap in Desalination Application

Abstract

The synthesis of Cellulose acetate membrane, based on coconut sap, was successful using the phase inversion method. This was then applied in the process of desalination, in order to ascertain to the performance. In addition, this is possibly affected by the introduction of additive, hence the aim of this research is to identify the possible effects. The additives used were polyethylene glycol (PEG) and formamide, and the membrane characteristics studied include flux, rejection, tensile strength, and pore size. The result showed that cellulose acetate membrane with PEG has 17.43 L/(m2.h) of flux and 32.23% rejection, while 7.8 L/(m 2 .h) of flux and 46% rejection were reported for formamide. Conversely, the rejection recorded without the introduction of additive was 25%, hence it is assumed that additives increase membrane performance. Also, formamide was confirmed to better improve characteristic than PEG.