Green Preparation of a Carboxymethyl Cellulose-Coated Membrane for Highly Efficient Separation of Crude Oil-In-Water Emulsions

Langmuir. 2022 Jun 7;38(22):7067-7076. doi: 10.1021/acs.langmuir.2c00834. Epub 2022 May 26.

Abstract

Developing high-performance membranes is an extremely significant strategy to combat increasing severe oil pollution. However, most of the previously reported superwettable membranes have been inevitably involved with the use of toxic solvents and complicated preparation processes. In addition, most of them lacked the capacity of separating crude oil-in-water emulsions. Herein, a facile and green strategy is employed to fabricate a polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) membrane with a mixed suspension of PDA@ZIF-8 and carboxymethyl cellulose (CMC) using water as a solvent via the vacuum filtration method. Combining hydrophilic property with micro-nano-roughness, the CMC-PDA@ZIF-8-coated PTFE membrane (CPZP membrane) exhibits excellent underwater superoleophobicity. More importantly, the separation efficiency of various surfactant-stabilized oil-in-water emulsions including crude oil/water emulsion is higher than 99.2% with a flux up to 1306.5 L m-2 h-1, and the separation performance remains nearly the same after 10 cycles. Moreover, outstanding underwater superoleophobic and self-cleaning properties are maintained after long-distance sandpaper abrasion and multiple bending tests. Meanwhile, its exceptional separation performance is still maintained in harsh environments (3.5 wt % NaCl, 1 M HCl, 60 °C hot water) even after immersing it for 24 h. Therefore, this green-prepared and high-performance membrane has tremendous application prospects in treating oily wastewater.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Carboxymethylcellulose Sodium*
  • Emulsions
  • Oils
  • Petroleum*
  • Polytetrafluoroethylene

Substances

  • Emulsions
  • Oils
  • Petroleum
  • Polytetrafluoroethylene
  • Carboxymethylcellulose Sodium