Heavy metal removal by membrane filtration

In this study, a thin film composite (TFC) membrane was fabricated by using polysulfone (PSF) membrane as supporting layer and hybrid membrane as barrier layer. The inversion method was used in the production of the PSF membrane while the hybrid membrane was formulated by blending organic polymers chitosan (CS), polyethylene glycol (PEG), polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) and crosslinked with tetraethylorthosilicate (TEOS). The aim of this experiment to study the effect of varying the concentration of PVAon the characterization and performance of the TFC membrane. Two different PVA concentration were selected: 2 wt% and 3 wt%. The thin film composite was characterized by using Fourier Transform Infrared Specstrocopy (FTIR) and thermogravimetric analysis (TGA). In performance testing, pure water permeability (PWP) to measure water flux and antifouling properties by using humic acid and deionised water as feed solution was carried out. The performance testing also including mercury removal by using mercury solution in order to analysed the percentage of removal of the mercury. Results shows that TFC membrane with 3% PVA concentration have a better characterization and performance compared to TFC with 2% PVA concentration. Besides, this membrane is good in flux ratio and antifouling properties compared to the TFC with 2% PVA concentration. Overall, this formulation of TFC membrane have a great potential as antifouling membrane in membrane filtration applications.