Upcycled plastic membrane helps clean up waste

Plant-derived biosolvents enable the sustainable conversion of plastic waste into valuable membrane materials

10-Feb-2023 - Plastic waste can be used as a raw material for making high performance porous membranes. These could then be used in the chemical industry for the energy-efficient separation of complex chemical mixtures or to clean up waste streams, furtheradding to the environmental appeal of the ...

Greening hydrocarbon separation and crude oil refining

Polymer-based membranes that selectively separate hydrocarbon and crude oil mixtures could eclipse current industrial thermal processes

01-Sep-2022 - Polymer-based membranes developed at KAUST could enable greener and cheaper industrial separation approaches. Their stability and selectivity can be tuned by thermal crosslinking to separate simple hydrocarbon mixtures and complex crude oil fractions. Separation processes, such as distillation ...

New method purifies hydrogen from heavy carbon monoxide mixtures

Licensing the technology for a start-up

11-Apr-2022 - Refining metals, manufacturing fertilizers and powering fuel cells for heavy vehicles are all processes that require purified hydrogen. But purifying, or separating, that hydrogen from a mix of other gases can be difficult, with several steps. A research team led by Chris Arges, Penn State ...

New flexible soft-solid MOF composite membrane boosts H2/CO2 separation

14-Mar-2022 - Molecular sieve membrane-based separation technology, featuredwith low energy consumption and small carbon footprint, has attracted much attention in gas separation. Metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) arepromising in gas separation membranesdue to their diversified structures, high porosity and ...

Game-changing technology to remove 99% of carbon dioxide from air

Carbon capture advance could bring environmentally friendly fuel cells closer to market

07-Feb-2022 - University of Delaware engineers have demonstrated a way to effectively capture 99% of carbon dioxide from air using a novel electrochemical system powered by hydrogen. It is a significant advance for carbon dioxide capture and could bring more environmentally friendly fuel cells closer to ...

Fine-tuned hydrocarbon separation at low energy cost

Metal organic framework membranes that selectively separate hydrocarbons set the stage for more sustainable petrochemical processes

24-Sep-2021 - An electrochemical approach developed at KAUST produces molecular-sieving membranes that could enable a cheap energy-efficient separation of light hydrocarbons, such as olefins and paraffins. This separation, critical for the petrochemical industry, usually relies on extremely energy-intensive ...

A cool chemical separation technology

A diverse category of porous materials can separate and purify key industrial chemicals at low temperatures

11-Mar-2021 - Gas and liquid separation processes in the chemical industry could be made more efficient and environmentally friendly by using substances known as intrinsically porous materials (IPMs). KAUST researchers review the prospects for IPMs in the journal Accounts of Chemical Research. Niveen Khashab ...

Novel hydrogen fuel purification membrane paves the way for greener future

Researchers develop a novel membrane that efficiently purifies hydrogen fuel from a mixture of gases

10-Mar-2021 - Hydrogen has been hailed as the 'fuel of the future' owing to several reasons. First, compared to the conventionally used hydrocarbons, hydrogen exhibits higher energy yield. Second, the commercial use of hydrogen fuel, which yields only water as a byproduct product, would help mitigate the ...

Separating gases using flexible molecular sieves

04-Dec-2020 - Researchers at the University of Liverpool and the King Abdullah University of Science and Technology have made reported some exciting findings relating to metal-organic frameworks (MOFs), a class of porous materials, which could benefit a wide range of important gas separation ...

Climate protection: Chemists develop new material for the separation of CO₂ from industrial waste gases

The separation process is both energy efficient and cost-effective

22-Oct-2020 - Chemists at the University of Bayreuth have developed a material that could well make an important contribution to climate protection and sustainable industrial production. With this material, the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide (CO₂) can be specifically separated from industrial waste gases, ...