Performance of tannic acid/tetraethylenepentamine coated polymeric membrane for the separation of different surfactant-stabilized oil in water emulsions

Abstract

The present research reported on the surface coating of PVDF membrane with polyphenolic-amine, which improves the hydrophilicity and underwater oleophobic properties. The separation efficiency and antifouling property of emulsion oil by pristine PVDF and polyphenolic-amine coated PVDF microfiltration membranes were evaluated. The performance of pristine and coated membrane was compared using three different types of surfactant-stabilized oil droplets (T80/Diesel/H2O, SDS/Diesel/H2O and CTAB/Diesel/H2O) in terms of flux recovery ratio (FRR) and removal efficiency. The continuous cycle using cross-flow filtration mode was also investigated. The filtration experiments indicated that modifying the surface properties of the PVDF polymer membrane by polyphenolic-amine coating method can significantly improve the antifouling properties compared to unmodified polymeric membranes.