Hydrothermal Stable Templated Molecular Sieve Silica (TMSS) Membranes for Gas Separation

In this work we compare the hydrothermal stability performance of a Templated Molecular Sieve Silica (TMSS) membrane against a standard, non-templated Molecular Sieve Silica (MSS) membrane. The tests were carried under dry and wet (steam) conditions and characterised using pure gases (He, H2, CO and CO2) at 1-2 atm membrane pressure drop at 200°C. Single gas TMSS membrane H2, permeance and H2/CO permselectivity was found to be 2.05 x 10 mols.m.s.Pa and 15, respectively. The MSS membrane showed similar selectivity, but increased overall flux. He permeance through membranes decayed at a rate of 4-5 x 10 mols.m.s.Pa per day regardless of membrane ambience (dry or wet). Although H2/CO permselectivity of the TMSS membrane slightly improved from 15 to 18 after steam testing, the MSS membrane resulted in significant reduction from 16 to 8.3. In addition, membrane regeneration after more than 50 days resulted in the TMSS membrane reverting to its original permeation levels while no significant improvements were observed for the MSS membrane. Results showed that the TMSS membrane had enhanced hydrothermal stability and regeneration ability.