Pebax® 2533/Graphene Oxide Nanocomposite Membranes for Carbon Capture

In this work, the behavior of new GO-based mixed matrix membranes was tested in view of their use as CO2-selective membrane in post combustion carbon capture applications. In particular, the new materials were obtained by mixing of Pebax® 2533 copolymer with different types of graphene oxide (GO). Pebax® 2533 has indeed lower selectivity, but higher permeability than Pebax® 1657, which is more commonly used for membranes, and it could therefore benefit from the addition of GO, which is endowed with very high selectivity of CO2 with respect to nitrogen. The mixed matrix membranes were obtained by adding different amounts of GO, from 0.02 to 1% by weight, to the commercial block copolymers. Porous graphene oxide (PGO) and GO functionalized with polyetheramine (PEAGO) were also considered in composites produced with similar procedure, with a loading of 0.02%wt. The obtained films were then characterized by using SEM, DSC, XPS analysis and permeability experiments. In particular, permeation tests with pure CO2 and N2 at 35°C and 1 bar of upstream pressure were conducted for the different materials to evaluate their separation performance. It has been discovered that adding these GO-based nanofillers to Pebax® 2533 matrix does not improve the ideal selectivity of the material, but it allows to increase CO2 permeability when a low filler content, not higher than 0.02 wt%, is considered. Among the different types of GO, then, porous GO seems the most promising as it shows CO2 permeability in the order of 400 barrer (with an increase of about 10% with respect to the unloaded block copolymer), obtained without reducing the CO2/N2 selectivity of the materials, which remained in the order of 25.