Novel Porous Ceramic Tube-Supported Polymer Layer Membranes for Acetic Acid/Water Separation by Pervaporation Dewatering

Abstract New polymer-ceramic hybrid membranes consisting of sulfonated polybenzimidazole (sPBI) coating layer on porous ceramic tube supports have been successfully developed for acetic acid/water separation by selective pervaporation removal of water from the liquid mixtures. The enabling preparation procedure that were critical to form crack/defect-free polymer layer coated intimately on the wall surface of ceramic support tubes is reported. Air humidity during dip coating, the dying method, and pre-mixing of polymer solution were found critical to the intimate adherence, crack-free, and uniformity of the coating membrane layer on the wall of porous ceramic tube. Our hybrid membranes have shown a high-flux selective separation performance data: 2.5-10 times higher flux than previously reported state-of-the-art value (∼0.15 LMH) for free-standing sPBI polymer membranes. Also, the ceramic tube-supported membranes provide better mechanical ruggedness, pervaporation stability, and a unique platform for large scale multi-tube membrane module applications.