Fabrication and stability exploration of hollow fiber mordenite zeolite membranes for isopropanol/water mixture separation

High performance mordenite zeolite membranes were fabricated on four-channel Al2O3 hollow fiber substrates for the first time by using ball-milled mordenite particles as seeds. It was found that the particle size of seed played a vital part in the growth of membrane layers. The mordenite particles with a size of approximately 300 nm via ball milling enabled the growth of zeolite to form a uniform and defect-free zeolite membrane. The as-fabricated membranes showed high performance for isopropanol (IPA)/water mixtures separation. For IPA/H2O (90/10 wt%) mixture dehydration at 75 degrees C by pervaporation, the permeation flux of 1.43 kg m(-2)h(-1) and the separation selectivity of > 10000 were achieved. The influence of feed water content on the separation performance of mordenite membrane was studied in detail. In addition to good dehydration performance at a low feed water content, the mordenite zeolite membranes also demonstrated long time stable separation performance for high feed water content systems. Permporosimetry measurements and molecular simulations showed that, unlike NaA zeolite crystal, the adsorbate water affected the expansion/contraction of MOR zeolite crystal framework weakly. Our research shows that MOR zeolite membrane shows good potential for the industrial solvent dehydration applications.