Selective adsorption and separation of methylene blue from wastewater by self-standing polyvinylpyrrolidone and SiO2 electrospun membranes

Abstract

Recently there has been urgent need for adsorbents with selective and high adsorption efficiency for industrial wastewater treatment. In this work, a self-standing polyvinylpyrrolidone (PVP)-SiO2 derivative membrane was prepared by electrospinning to give highly effective adsorbents suitable for application. Under optimum conditions the methylene blue (MB) removal rate was ∼95 % in 80 min. Contributed to the free-standing of the membrane, flowing MB wastewater with a rate of 17 mL min−1 could be purified by passing through the membrane. The removal rate of the membrane to the flowing wastewater was still higher than 95 %. In addition, the re-application ability of the membrane was excellent, and the MB removal rate was still higher than 90 % after 4 times recycling. Therefore, the membrane had potential application ability in dye wastewater treatment. In addition, simulation calculations confirmed that hydrophobic interaction and electrostatic attraction were the main driving forces for adsorption.