Facilitated transport of CO2 through novel imidazole-containing chitosan derivative/PES membranes

Abstract

In the present study, a new imidazole alkyl derivative of chitosan (Im-CS) is synthesized and characterized by FT-IR and ¹H-NMR spectroscopy. This derivative was blended in various ratios with polyethersulfone (PES) to fabricate newly integrally skinned PES membranes. Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) was used to study the changes in the membrane morphologies. The prepared membranes were used for the separation of CO₂ from CH₄. Our findings indicated that by adding a small amount of Im-CS, membrane performance was improved significantly. In addition, the effect of feed pressure and feed temperature on the performance of the prepared membranes was investigated in this study.