Penetrant competition and plasticization in membranes: How negatives can be positives in natural gas sweetening

Membranes are attractive for upgrading natural gas; however, the gas permeation processes through membranes challenging to control. The coexistence of condensable H2S and CO2 typically causes membrane performance decline under practical feed conditions, due uncontrolled penetrant competition undesired plasticization polymer matrix. In this paper, we report a strategy successfully transform these apparent negatives, i.e. competition, into positives that boost sweetening efficiency greatly. Our is disperse engineered metal organic framework (MOF) fillers designed matrices form hybrid membranes, which promote both but hinder CH4 permeation. Moreover, uniformly dispersed MOF also significantly alter responses matrices, enabling controlled benefits. Ultimately, illustrate highly tunable MOF-polymer platform meets diverse requirements aggressive conditions.