Fabrication of Defect-Free P84® Polyimide Hollow Fiber for Gas Separation: Pathway to Formation of Optimized Structure
by
Miren Etxeberria-Benavides 1,2,*
, Oguz Karvan 1,3, Freek Kapteijn 2, Jorge Gascon 2,4 and Oana David 1,*
Miren Etxeberria-Benavides 1,2,*, Oguz Karvan 1,3, Freek Kapteijn 2, Jorge Gascon 2,4 and Oana David 1,*
1
TECNALIA, Parque Tecnológico de San Sebastián, Mikeletegi Pasealekua 2, 20009 Donostia-San Sebastián, Spain
2
Catalysis Engineering, Chemical Engineering Department, Delft University of Technology, Van der Maasweg 9, 2629 HZ Delft, The Netherlands
3
European Membrane Institute Twente (EMI), Faculty of Science and Technology, University of Twente, P.O. Box 217, 7522NB AE Enschede, The Netherlands
4
KAUST Catalysis Center, Advanced Catalytic Materials, King Abdullah University of Science and Technology, Thuwal 23955, Saudi Arabia
*
Authors to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Membranes 2020, 10(1), 4; https://doi.org/10.3390/membranes10010004
Received: 28 November 2019 / Revised: 13 December 2019 / Accepted: 22 December 2019 / Published: 25 December 2019
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Membranes for Gas Separation)
The elimination of the additional defect healing post-treatment step in asymmetric hollow fiber manufacturing would result in a significant reduction in membrane production cost. However, obtaining integrally skinned polymeric asymmetric hollow fiber membranes with an ultrathin and defect-free selective layer is quite challenging. In this study, P84® asymmetric hollow fiber membranes with a highly thin (~56 nm) defect-free skin were successfully fabricated by fine tuning the dope composition and spinning parameters using volatile additive (tetrahydrofuran, THF) as key parameters. An extensive experimental and theoretical study of the influence of volatile THF addition on the solubility parameter of the N-methylpyrrolidone/THF solvent mixture was performed. Although THF itself is not a solvent for P84®, in a mixture with a good solvent for the polymer, like N-Methyl-2-pyrrolidone (NMP), it can be dissolved at high THF concentrations (NMP/THF ratio > 0.52). The as-spun fibers had a reproducible ideal CO2/N2 selectivity of 40, and a CO2 permeance of 23 GPU at 35 °C. The fiber production can be scaled-up with retention of the selectivity.
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MDPI and ACS Style
Etxeberria-Benavides, M.; Karvan, O.; Kapteijn, F.; Gascon, J.; David, O. Fabrication of Defect-Free P84® Polyimide Hollow Fiber for Gas Separation: Pathway to Formation of Optimized Structure. Membranes 2020, 10, 4.
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