Postcombustion Carbon Capture Using Thin-Film Composite Membranes

Abstract

Conspectus Climate change due to anthropogenic carbon dioxide emissions (e.g., combustion of fossil fuels) represents one of the most profound environmental disasters of this century. Equipping power plants with carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology has the potential to reduce current worldwide CO2 emissions. However, existing CCS schemes (i.e., amine scrubbing) are highly energy-intensive. The urgent abatement of CO2 emissions relies on the development of new, efficient technologies to capture CO2 from existing power plants. Membrane-based CO2 separation is an attractive technology that meets many of the requirements for energy-efficient industrial carbon capture. Within this domain, thin-film composite (TFC) membranes are particularly attractive, providing high gas permeance in comparison with conventional thicker (∼50 μm) dense membranes. TFC membranes are usually composed of three layers: (1) a bottom porous support layer; (2) a highly permeable intermediate gutter layer; and (3) a thin (<1 μm) species-selective top layer. A key challenge in the development of TFC membranes has been to simultaneously maximize the transmembrane gas permeance of the assembled membrane (by minimizing the gas resistance of each layer) while maintaining high gas-specific selectivity. In this Account, we provide an overview of our recent development of high-performance TFC membrane materials as well as insights into the unique fabrication strategies employed for the selective layer and gutter layer. Optimization of each layer of the membrane assembly individually results in significant improvements in overall membrane performance. First, incorporating nanosized fillers into the selective layer (poly­(ethylene glycol)-based polymers) and reducing its thickness (to ca. 50 nm) through continuous assembly of polymers technology yields major improvements in CO2 permeance without loss of selectivity. Second, we focus on optimization of the middle gutter layer of TFC membranes. The development of enhanced gutter layers employing two- and three-dimensional metal–organic framework materials leads to considerable improvements in both CO2 permeance and selectivity compared with traditional poly­(dimethylsiloxane) materials. Third, incorporation of a porous, flexible support layer culminates in a mechanically robust high-performance TFC membrane design that exhibits unprecedented CO2 separation performance and holds significant potential for industrial CO2 capture. Alternative strategies are also emerging, whereby the selective layer and gutter layer may be combined for enhanced membrane efficiency. This Account highlights the CO2 capture performance, current challenges, and future research directions in designing high-performance TFC membranes.

CO2/N2 Gas Separation Using Pebax/ZIF-7—PSf Composite Membranes

“…With ZIF-7 mixed into Pebax-2533, the melting point identified at the PTMO peak increased to approximately 294 K up to ZIF-7 35 wt% and decreased sharply at 50 wt%. Furthermore, the melting enthalpy of pure Pebax-2533 was similar to the values reported by J. Kim et al [31], and it was shown to decrease gradually with mixing with ZIF-7; we calculated the degree of crystallization using Equation ( 7) for a single substance and Equation (8) for the whole substance. The heat of fusion (∆H m • ) of PTMO and PA-12 was found to be 220 J/g [31,49] and 209 J/g [49,50], respectively.…”

“…Thus, numerous attempts have been made to improve the affinity between polymer and particles, and there have been reports of improvements in existing pure membrane permeability properties by using them in an MMM. Unlike these MMMs, in TFC membranes manufactured with thin selective layers, permeability resistance decreases and permeability increases as the membrane gets thinner [5,7,8]. In general, thinning the selective layer in the membrane results in a decrease in the mechanical strength; therefore, it is manufactured by applying it on top of porous substrates.…”

“…In general, thinning the selective layer in the membrane results in a decrease in the mechanical strength; therefore, it is manufactured by applying it on top of porous substrates. Porous substrates have good mechanical strength, low resistance so that the permeation selectivity remains unaffected, very high permeability, and low selectivity [5,8,9]. When a selective layer is applied directly onto the substrate, the solution may permeate into the pore, causing defects in the selective layer, and obtaining a selective layer with a uniform thickness may become challenging.…”

“…When a selective layer is applied directly onto the substrate, the solution may permeate into the pore, causing defects in the selective layer, and obtaining a selective layer with a uniform thickness may become challenging. Therefore, a gutter layer (or an intermediate layer) is applied to protect the selective layer with little impact on the permeating selectivity and helps to maintain a uniform thickness of the selective layer [8,10].…”

Influence of ionic liquid-like cationic pendants composition in cellulose based polyelectrolytes on membrane-based CO2 separation

“…Alternative strategies to reduce the PE's environmental impact are seen in their minimised consumption during the membrane fabrication process. Various methods to deposit ultra-thin PEs layers have been reviewed recently (Liu, Nothling, Webley, Fu, & Qiao, 2019;Nikolaeva & Luis, 2020;Singh & Savoy, 2020;Zhang et al, 2020). The material and process optimisation yielded selectivities exceeding 100 with moderate permeances of approximately 10 GPU, surpassing the Robeson upper bound for C0 2 /N 2 .…”