Polyethersulfone Blended with Titanium Dioxide Nanoribbons/Multi-Wall Carbon Nanotubes for Strontium Removal from Water

Abstract

Nanofiltration methods were used and evaluated for strontium removal from wastewater. The phase inversion method was used to create a variety of polyethersulfone (PES)/TiO2 nanoribbons (TNRs)–multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) membranes with varied ratios of TNR-MWCNT nanocomposite. The hydrothermal technique was applied to synthesize the nanocomposite (TNRs-MWCNTs), which was then followed by chemical vapor deposition (CVD). The synthesized membranes were characterized by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), transmission electron microscopy, and FTIR. TNR macrovoids are employed as a support for the MWCNT growth catalyst, resulting in a TNR-MWCNT network composite. The hydrophilicity, mechanical properties, porosity, filtration efficiency of the strontium-containing samples, water flux, and fouling tendency were used to assess the performance of the synthesized membranes. The effect of feed water temperature on water flux was investigated as well as its effect on salt rejection. As the temperature increased from 30 to 90 °C, the salt rejection decreased from 96.6 to 82% for the optimized 0.7 PES/TNR-MWCNT membrane, whereas the water flux increased to ≈150 kg/m2. h. Double successive filtration was evaluated for its high efficiency of 1000 ppm strontium removal, which reached 82.4%.