Development of high performance pervaporation desalination membranes: A brief review

Water scarcity rises as the level of water pollution continues to increase with the progress of urbanization, industrialization and exponential growth of population. Therefore, saline water of the sea should also be made suitable rather than river water to meet the huge global demand of clean and safe drinking water. Pervaporation (PV) desalination, among many purification and separation processes, is a promising technology to reduce the crisis of global drinking water supply. From this perspective, the key success of PV desalination relies on its remarkable salt rejection from highly saline water with appropriate flux to obtain fresh water by using a suitable membrane. In this review we aim to provide a comprehensive assessment of PV desalination membrane materials, transport phenomena, the advantages of the process over comparable technologies (e.g., fractional distillation, membrane distillation, reverse osmosis) and the advantages of crosslinking during the preparation of composite membranes. This review further highlights the advantages of inorganic ceramic substrates as a support of composite membranes and the use of hydrophilic polymers as active layer for preparing stable and robust crosslinked PV desalination membranes.(c) 2022 Institution of Chemical Engineers. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Automated summary

As urbanization, industrialization, and population growth continue, water scarcity becomes more severe. Pervaporation (PV) desalination, a promising technology, can alleviate the crisis of global drinking water supply. This review provides a comprehensive assessment of PV desalination membrane materials, transport phenomena, and the advantages of crosslinking during membrane preparation.