Effect of feed pressure and long-term separation performance of Pebax-ionic liquid membranes for the recovery of difluoromethane (R32) from refrigerant mixture R410A

The R410A refrigerant blend (GWP = 2088), a near azeotropic and equimass mixture of difluoromethane (R32, GWP 675) pentafluoroethane (R125, 3500), has been included in the HFC phase down road map established worldwide. In this context, recovery value-added R32 from using membrane technology would be breakthrough refrigeration air conditioning sector, given that conventional distillation cannot applied to separation. For first time, work taken advantage combination ionic liquids polymeric membranes for separation constituents mixture. Results show remarkable improvement terms permeability R32/R125 selectivity composite containing 40 wt % [C2mim][SCN] (?R32/R125 up 14.5) [C2mim][BF4] 11.0) with respect neat polymer 6.9). Besides, long-term stability was successfully tested 25 days under high pressure conditions (7 12 bar), which makes these excellent candidates development membrane-based processes.