Water Adsorption Effect on Carbon Molecular Sieve Membranes in H 2 -CH 4 Mixture at High Pressure

Maria L. V. Nordio, José A. Medrano, Martin van Sint Annaland, David Alfredo Pacheco Tanaka, Margot Llosa Tanco and Fausto Gallucci
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Maria L. V. Nordio: Inorganic Membranes and Membrane Reactors, Sustainable Process Engineering, Department of Chemical Engineering and Chemistry, Eindhoven University of Technology, De Rondom 70, 5612 AP Eindhoven, The Netherlands
José A. Medrano: Inorganic Membranes and Membrane Reactors, Sustainable Process Engineering, Department of Chemical Engineering and Chemistry, Eindhoven University of Technology, De Rondom 70, 5612 AP Eindhoven, The Netherlands
Martin van Sint Annaland: Inorganic Membranes and Membrane Reactors, Sustainable Process Engineering, Department of Chemical Engineering and Chemistry, Eindhoven University of Technology, De Rondom 70, 5612 AP Eindhoven, The Netherlands
David Alfredo Pacheco Tanaka: Energy and Environment, TECNALIA Basque Research and Technology Alliance (BRTA), Mikeletegi Pasealekua 2, 20009 San Sebastian-Donostia, Spain
Margot Llosa Tanco: Energy and Environment, TECNALIA Basque Research and Technology Alliance (BRTA), Mikeletegi Pasealekua 2, 20009 San Sebastian-Donostia, Spain
Fausto Gallucci: Inorganic Membranes and Membrane Reactors, Sustainable Process Engineering, Department of Chemical Engineering and Chemistry, Eindhoven University of Technology, De Rondom 70, 5612 AP Eindhoven, The Netherlands

Energies, 2020, vol. 13, issue 14, 1-26

Abstract: Carbon molecular sieve membranes (CMSMs) are emerging as promising solution to overcome the drawbacks of Pd-based membranes for H 2 separation since (i) they are relatively easy to manufacture; (ii) they have low production and raw material costs; (iii) and they can work at conditions where polymeric and palladium membranes are not stable. In this work CMSMs have been investigated in pure gas and gas mixture tests for a proper understanding of the permeation mechanism, selectivity and purity towards hydrogen. No mass transfer limitations have been observed with these membranes, which represents an important advantage compared to Pd-Ag membranes, which suffer from concentration polarization especially at high pressure and low hydrogen concentrations. H 2 , CH 4 , CO 2 and N 2 permeation at high pressures and different temperatures in presence of dry and humidified stream (from ambient and water vapour) have been carried out to investigate the effect of the presence of water in the feed stream. Diffusion is the main mechanism observed for hydrogen, while methane, nitrogen and especially carbon dioxide permeate through adsorption-diffusion at low temperatures and high pressures. Finally, H 2 permeation from H 2 -CH 4 mixtures in presence of water has been compared at different temperatures and pressure, which demonstrates that water adsorption is an essential parameter to improve the performance of carbon molecular sieve membranes, especially when working at high temperature. Indeed, a hydrogen purity of 98.95% from 10% H 2 —90% CH 4 was achieved. The main aim of this work is to understand the permeation mechanisms of CMSMs in different operating conditions and find the best conditions to optimize the separation of hydrogen.

Keywords: carbon molecular sieve membrane; water adsorption; adsorption-diffusion mechanism; Knudsen mechanism; pore size (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
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