Improved performance of vacuum membrane distillation in desalination with zeolite membranes

•Faster calcination procedure.•Optimization of the vacuum membrane distillation performance.•Reduced cleaning time between membrane distillation tests. A supported Mordenite Framework Inverted (MFI) zeolite membrane with a length of 30 cm was synthesized by the secondary growth method using a fast h...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Separation and purification technology 2020-04, Vol.237, p.116376, Article 116376
Main Authors: Donato, L., Garofalo, A., Drioli, E., Alharbi, O., Aljlil, S.A., Criscuoli, A., Algieri, C.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Calcination
Desalination
Vacuum membrane distillation
Zeolite membrane
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:•Faster calcination procedure.•Optimization of the vacuum membrane distillation performance.•Reduced cleaning time between membrane distillation tests. A supported Mordenite Framework Inverted (MFI) zeolite membrane with a length of 30 cm was synthesized by the secondary growth method using a fast heating profile for the template removal (calcination) step. The presence of defects into the zeolite layer (before and after calcination) was assessed by means of single gas permeation tests. Afterwards, the membrane performance was evaluated in Vacuum Membrane Distillation (VMD) for desalination. Two cleaning procedures were applied between consecutive experiments on salty solutions and their efficiency compared. NaCl rejections of 99.9% were achieved for feeds ranging from 0.2 M to 0.9 M, dropping down to 97% for the 1.2 M feed. The highest trans-membrane flux (20.6 kg m−2 h−1) was measured for 0.2 M feed, by working at 70 °C and 120 L/h.
ISSN:1383-5866
1873-3794
DOI:10.1016/j.seppur.2019.116376