Separation of dimethyl carbonate/methanol mixtures by pervaporation with poly(acrylic acid)/poly(vinyl alcohol) blend membranes

摘要

A serial of poly(acrylic acid) (PAA)/poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA) blend membranes with different PAA/PVA ratio were prepared for separating dimethyl carbonate (DMC)/methanol (MeOH) mixtures by pervaporation. FTIR was used to determine whether there was an esterification reaction between PAA and PVA. Swelling experiments were carried out in DMC/MeOH mixtures by using different blend membranes to investigate the swelling behavior of the membranes. The blend membranes with different PAA content were used to separate DMC/MeOH azeotrope through pervaporation experiments. The effects of operation temperatures and feed composition on pervaporation performances were also investigated. The results showed that the blend membrane containing 70 wt. PAA had a highest separation factor of 13 and a permeate flux of 577 g/(m(2) h) at 60 degrees C for separating DMC/MeOH azeotrope, which could be expected that the membrane prepared in this work should be used to separate DMC/MeOH mixtures in real application. (c) 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.