A Contemplating Review on Pure and Modified Polymeric Membranes for O2/N2 Separation

Shakir Ul Azam; Arshad Hussain; Sarah Farrukh; Witold Kwapinski; Muhammad Ayoub

Abstract

The separation of O2/N2 by using membrane technology from air got the interest of the process industries due to its advantage over the conventional technologies like cryogenic distillation and pressure swing adsorption, in terms of simplicity, size, economic and power consumption. Membrane material selection for the separation of O2/N2 is challenging because most of the materials have low selectivityand others have low permeability. To meet both the selectivity of O2/N2 and permeability of O2for commercial use, different modifications have been done, like physical, chemical and surface modification by using methods like blending, cross-linking, morphology changing (asymmetric membranes), surface coating, and by incorporating additives which provide synergistic properties to the membrane performance. This review will discuss pure polymeric membranes, polymer blends, polymer crosslinking, asymmetric membranes, composite membranes and mixed matrix membranes for the separation of O2/N2 and ended up by giving future direction to achieve commercial-grade membranes for O2/N2 separation.Keywords:O2/N2 separation, membrane performance, membrane modules, membrane modification, mixed matrix membranes.