Facile preparation of melamine foam with superhydrophobic performance and its system integration with prototype equipment for the clean-up of oil spills on water surface

Lei Mu; Xiu Yue; Bin Hao; Rui Wang; Peng-Cheng Ma

doi:10.1016/j.scitotenv.2022.155184

Facile preparation of melamine foam with superhydrophobic performance and its system integration with prototype equipment for the clean-up of oil spills on water surface

Sci Total Environ. 2022 Aug 10:833:155184. doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2022.155184. Epub 2022 Apr 10.

Authors

Lei Mu¹, Xiu Yue², Bin Hao³, Rui Wang⁴, Peng-Cheng Ma⁵

Affiliations

¹ Laboratory of Environmental Science and Technology, The Xinjiang Technical Institute of Physics and Chemistry, Key Laboratory of Functional Materials and Devices for Special Environments, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Urumqi 830011, China; Center of Materials Science and Optoelectronics Engineering, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China. Electronic address: mulei12@mails.ucas.ac.cn.
² Laboratory of Environmental Science and Technology, The Xinjiang Technical Institute of Physics and Chemistry, Key Laboratory of Functional Materials and Devices for Special Environments, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Urumqi 830011, China; Center of Materials Science and Optoelectronics Engineering, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China. Electronic address: yuexiu@ms.xjb.ac.cn.
³ Laboratory of Environmental Science and Technology, The Xinjiang Technical Institute of Physics and Chemistry, Key Laboratory of Functional Materials and Devices for Special Environments, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Urumqi 830011, China; Center of Materials Science and Optoelectronics Engineering, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China. Electronic address: haobin@ms.xjb.ac.cn.
⁴ CAS-Realnm Separation Science and Technology Company, Wuxi 214001, China. Electronic address: wangrui@ruiliem.com.
⁵ Laboratory of Environmental Science and Technology, The Xinjiang Technical Institute of Physics and Chemistry, Key Laboratory of Functional Materials and Devices for Special Environments, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Urumqi 830011, China; Center of Materials Science and Optoelectronics Engineering, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China. Electronic address: mapc@ms.xjb.ac.cn.

PMID: 35417731
DOI: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2022.155184

Abstract

A simple and efficient method was developed to rectify the surface properties of commercial melamine foam. The process was based on the siloxane coating originated from the silanization of methyltrimethoxysilane and tetraethoxysilane. The foam can be easily scaled up by employing low-cost chemicals and devices. The studies on the properties of the material showed that the wettability of melamine foam was changed to superhydrophobic with a water contact angle of 156° due to the presence of alkylsilane. The modified foam exhibited excellent oil/water selectivity and high oil absorption capacities of 77-163 times its own weight. The retention of absorption capacity was greater than 97% after 5000 cycles compression. These fascinating characteristics made the modified foam exceptional recyclability for commonly organic solvents and oils without obvious dissolution/swelling. Based on these inspiring results, the material can be employed for the continuous separation of various oil compounds floating on water surface with the assistance of a vacuum pump. Moreover, the prepared material was integrated with an apparatus to develop a prototype oil collector for the remediation of oil spills in a larger open-air environment. The devices could be readily used in a range of real-world applications, including industrial oil spill clean-up.

Keywords: Melamine foam; Oil-water separation; Super-hydrophobicity; Surface modification; System integration.

MeSH terms

Hydrophobic and Hydrophilic Interactions
Oils / chemistry
Petroleum Pollution* / analysis
Triazines

Substances

Oils
Triazines
melamine