Copper oxide coated nanofibrous membrane for oil-water separation

• Main Author: Chen, Sihui
• Other Authors: Sun Delai, Darren
• Format: Final Year Project
• Language: English
• Published: 2018
• Subjects: DRNTU::Engineering::Civil engineering
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10356/76239
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

Due to the urban development and population growth, the water crisis has become a serious issue around the world. Oil spill, one of the main factors contributing to water pollution, has been receiving increasing attention. Traditional oil removal process including physical, chemical and biological processes are either time-consuming or harmful to the ecosystem. As a result, membranes technology could be the potential technology to solve this issue due to its rapid development and minimal adverse impact on the environment. However, fouling is the main disadvantage of membrane technology. To overcome this challenge, a superhydrophilic surface can be added on top of the membrane to reduce the fouling tendency. This study proposed to fabricate a copper coated nano-fibrous membrane to achieve superhydrophilic property for oil-water separation. Electrospinning was applied in this study due to its flexibility for different applications. It allowed producing the membrane with high porosity to increase flux and permeate output. The hydrothermal process was adopted to produce the copper oxide coating on PVDF membrane. Copper oxide was grown on the hydrophobic PVDF by immersing the membrane in tetraamminecopper (II) solution with 70°C. The membrane fabricated showed superhydrophilic and had high performance in the oil-water separation (rejection rate ~99.9%) for cooking oil and olive oil. Therefore, the superhydrophilic nano-fibrous membrane exhibited great potential for the oil removal. However, more surface modifications are still required to carry out to optimize the membrane surface, thus improving oil-water separation efficiency for other types of oil.