Fabrication of Carbon Nanotube Membrane for Enhanced Performance in Forward Osmosis Process

Abstract

In this study, we investigated the effect of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) and performance of the prepared membranes. Thin film composite (TFC) forward osmosis (FO) membranes were fabricated based on the polyacrylonitrile (PAN) substrate, incorporating carbon nanotubes (CNTs) in the active skin layer. The CNTs can improve the water flux through added the hydrophilic groups. The mean surface roughness and hydrophilicity increased with the concentration of carbon nanotubes increased. The TFC membranes incorporated CNTs (0.2 wt%) exhibited the best FO performance with water flux of 25.14 L/m2·h and reverse salt flux of 8.64 g/m2·h using 0.5 M NaCl as draw solution and DI water as feed solution during FO test. The research provides us a promising approach to fabricate the high flux FO membranes.