تصنيع أغشية متقدمة من خليط أكسيد الغرافين المعالج و البولي سيلفون و استخدامها في معالجة المياه الملوثة بالزيوت العضوية

Abstract EN

Proper treatment of oily wastewater streams can constitute a reusable water source.

Membrane technology can provide an efficient treatment process to reduce the oil content in the water stream to an acceptable level.

Current commercial polymeric membranes combine ease of fabrication and separation efficiency but suffer from bio and organic fouling.

In this paper, we discuss the design, fabrication, characterization, and testing of ultrafiltration (UF) mixed matrix membranes (MMM) for separation of water-oil emulsion by incorporation of small concentrations of functionalized graphene oxide (fGO) into polysulfone (PS) matrix.

fGO is synthesized by functionalizing graphene oxide (GO) with amine and carboxylic groups, and the functionalization was confirmed EDX.

Subsequently, the PS-MMMs containing 0, 0.05, 0.1, 0.2, 0.4, and 0.8 wt.% of fGO were fabricated via phase inversion process.

The fabricated membrane showed enhanced hydrophilicity and mechanical properties compared to the pristine PS membrane.

The loading of f-GO in the MMMs dictates the membrane hydrophilicity and separation performance with low f-GO loading of 0.1 - 0.2 wt.% demonstrating the biggest improvement in water flux, oil rejection, and biofouling resistance relative to the pristine PS membrane.

This low concertation does not impact the cost of the membrane nor the rheological properties of the PS-fGO solution and, therefore, does not require alteration of the current commercial fabrication process.

In conclusion, our results indicate that MMMs based on functionalized graphene oxide are very promising for water oil separation and can serve as the basis of advanced treatment of oily wastewater streams.