Constructing a highly tough, durable, and renewable flexible filter by epitaxial growth of a glass fiber fabric for high flux and superefficient oil-water separation

Yiwen Wang; Fanxiang Meng; Lei Han; Xiangyu Liu; Fang Guo; Hang Lu; Dehao Cheng; Wenbo Wang

doi:10.1016/j.jhazmat.2023.130807

Constructing a highly tough, durable, and renewable flexible filter by epitaxial growth of a glass fiber fabric for high flux and superefficient oil-water separation

J Hazard Mater. 2023 Apr 15:448:130807. doi: 10.1016/j.jhazmat.2023.130807. Epub 2023 Jan 18.

Authors

Yiwen Wang¹, Fanxiang Meng¹, Lei Han¹, Xiangyu Liu¹, Fang Guo¹, Hang Lu¹, Dehao Cheng¹, Wenbo Wang²

Affiliations

¹ College of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Inner Mongolia University, Hohhot 010021, PR China.
² College of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Inner Mongolia University, Hohhot 010021, PR China. Electronic address: wangwenbo@imu.edu.cn.

PMID: 36709734
DOI: 10.1016/j.jhazmat.2023.130807

Abstract

The separation and purification of complex and stable stubborn oily sewage is extremely challenging. To respond to this challenge, we developed a powerful flexible filter with ultrahigh strength, durability, flux, separation efficiency, and a multiobjective separation function based on a universal epitaxial growth process of glass fiber fabric (Gf). The underwater oil contact angle (UOCA) of the silicate@Gf (MgSi@Gf) filter is 156.3°, so it can achieve both an ultrahigh permeation flux (5632.7 L·m^-2·h^-1) and oil-water separation efficiency (99.5%) under gravity (≈ 1 kPa) in purifying surfactant-stabilized emulsions, actual industrial oily sewage and mechanical cold rolling emulsions. The filter with a high tensile strength (66.5 MPa) and oil invasion pressure (4626 Pa) can withstand the impact of much sewage or intense water flow. The filter can tolerate extreme conditions and can maintain high separation performance in acid or alkaline (pH 1-13), high or low temperature (100 °C, 200 °C, -18 °C) conditions or natural salty waters such as seawater. The filter can remove methylene blue (MB) dye (99.8%) by filtration, and can be repeatedly and easily reconstructed (renewable advantage). The filter shows great potential for efficiently eliminating the hazards of contaminants in actual oily sewage and thus protect human health.

Keywords: Epitaxial growth; Glass-fiber fabric; Oil-water separation; Silicate; Underwater superoleophobic.