Effect of various oil/water emulsion concentration towards PVDF/HMO mixed matrix membrane performance

Abstract

Meeting environmental quality standard for water and freshwater requires the use of innovative technologies, such as membrane technology for treating oily wastewater. Nevertheless, polymeric membrane require modification, as it is incapable of separating or removing oil molecules from oily wastewater. As such, this study incorporated the hydrous manganese dioxide (HMO) with polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF) to attain mixed matrix membrane (MMM) for separation of various oil/water emulsion concentration feeds (50 ppm, 100 ppm, 500 ppm and 1000 ppm) by using lubricant oil. It was observed that the addition of HMO in MMM had altered the membrane surface morphology, as well as the wetting properties. The presence of HMO in the MMM had increased the membrane hydrophilicity, as it reduced the water contact angle value by up to 40%. Apart from that, the MMM was able to increase the oleophobicity of the membrane by increasing 35% of the oil contact angle value. Both pristine PVDF membrane and PVDF/HMO MMM showed a flux decline with increasing oil/water emulsion concentration but managed to achieve oil rejection percentage greater than 93%.