Issue 11, 2022

Conductive nanofiltration membrane with a hydrogel coated stainless steel mesh support for electrically enhanced fouling mitigation potential

Abstract

The performance of nanofiltration (NF) membranes will inevitably be compromised by membrane fouling in real practice. Electro-conductive NF membranes with the assistance of an external electric field have strong prospects in membrane fouling mitigation. In this study, we developed a facile approach to synthesize a conductive thin-film composite (TFC) NF membrane. Kevlar hydrogel was first pre-coated on a stainless steel mesh (SSM) for the formation of a conductive composite support (SMM-K) through phase inversion. The hydrogel medium enabled adequate amine monomer storage and thereby a homogeneous interfacial polymerization (IP) reaction, producing a dense and continuous polyamide (PA) active layer. The synthesized SSM-K-PA NF membrane showed an ∼70% increase of water permeance compared to the NF270 membrane while maintaining an ideal SO42−/Cl selectivity (95.3 ± 1.0% for Na2SO4 rejection and 15.5 ± 1.8% for NaCl). The attachment of the hydrogel and the deposition of the PA layer did not significantly affect the electrochemical properties of the SSM. The SSM-K-PA NF membrane acted as the cathode in an electrically-assisted NF system and showed an antifouling performance against wastewater containing bovine serum albumin (BSA) when an external electric field was applied in situ. This work paves a new way to fabricate conductive TFC NF membranes with favorable NF performance and electro-assisted fouling mitigation potential.

Graphical abstract: Conductive nanofiltration membrane with a hydrogel coated stainless steel mesh support for electrically enhanced fouling mitigation potential

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
08 Jun 2022
Accepted
04 Sep 2022
First published
06 Sep 2022

Environ. Sci.: Water Res. Technol., 2022,8, 2652-2662

Conductive nanofiltration membrane with a hydrogel coated stainless steel mesh support for electrically enhanced fouling mitigation potential

J. Chen, X. Wang, Y. Li, R. Dai and Z. Wang, Environ. Sci.: Water Res. Technol., 2022, 8, 2652 DOI: 10.1039/D2EW00436D

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