Green Techniques for Rapid Fabrication of Unprecedentedly High-Performance PEO Membranes for CO<sub>2</sub> Capture
Wei-Shi Sun, Ming‐Jie Yin, Wenhai Zhang, Shuo Li, Naixin Wang, Quan‐Fu An
Abstract
Excessive CO2 emissions arising from fossil energy utilization pose severe threats to the environment, climate, and biological species. To this end, high-efficiency separation membranes have been developed to mitigate emerging challenges. Bisphenol A ethoxylate diacrylate (BPA) and poly(ethylene glycol) methyl ether acrylate (PEGMEA) were UV-cross-linked in the presence of low molecular weight poly(ethylene glycol) dimethyl ether (PEGDME) to prepare high-performance CO2 capture membranes in a green way. During the entire membrane fabrication process, no additional solvent was involved and no waste of membrane materials occurred, resulting in a green process. The such-prepared membrane presents an outstanding CO2 permeability of 4883 Barrer, a new record for poly(ethylene oxide) membranes, with a high CO2/N2 ideal selectivity of 43 due to the cooperative contribution of BPA and PEGDME. The unprecedented separation performance of our manufactured membrane is even higher than that of the 2019 CO2/N2 upper bound. Considering the rapid, cost-effective, and green fabrication process, our membrane potentially offers a dramatic advantage in alleviating the current greenhouse gas issue and shows great promise for practical applications.