Miscible blend polyethersulfone/polyimide asymmetric membrane crosslinked with 1,3-diaminopropane for hydrogen separation

• Main Authors: Nasir, Nur' Adilah Abdul, Alshaghdari, Ameen Gabr Ahmed, Mohd Junaidi, Mohd Usman, Hashim, Nur Awanis, Rabuni, Mohamad Fairus, Rohani, Rosiah
• Format: Article
• Published: De Gruyter 2021
• Subjects: TA Engineering (General). Civil engineering (General)
• Online Access: http://eprints.um.edu.my/28451/
• Institution: Universiti Malaya

Efficient purification technology is crucial to fully utilize hydrogen (H-2) as the next generation fuel source. Polyimide (PI) membranes have been intensively applied for H-2 purification but its current separation performance of neat PI membranes is insufficient to fulfill industrial demand. This study employs blending and crosslinking modification simultaneously to enhance the separation efficiency of a membrane. Polyethersulfone (PES) and Co-PI (P84) blend asymmetric membranes have been prepared via dry-wet phase inversion with three different ratios. Pure H-2 and carbon dioxide (CO2) gas permeation are conducted on the polymer blends to find the best formulation for membrane composition for effective H-2 purification. Next, the membrane with the best blending ratio is chemically modified using 1,3-diaminopropane (PDA) with variable reaction time. Physical and chemical characterization of all membranes was evaluated using field emission scanning electron microscope (FESEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD), and Fourier transform infrared (FTIR). Upon 15 min modification, the polymer membrane achieved an improvement on H-2/CO2 selectivity by 88.9%. Moreover, similar membrane has demonstrated the best performance as it has surpassed Robeson's upper bound curve for H-2/CO2 gas pair performance. Therefore, this finding is significant towards the development of H-2-selective membranes with improved performance.