Ceramic Processing of Silicon Carbide Membranes with the Aid of Aluminum Nitrate Nonahydrate: Preparation, Characterization, and Performance

Abstract

The development of a low-cost and environmentally-friendly procedure for the fabrication of silicon carbide (SiC) membranes while achieving good membrane performance is an important goal, but still a big challenge. To address this challenge, herein, a colloidal coating suspension of sub-micron SiC powders was prepared in aqueous media by employing aluminum nitrate nonahydrate as a sintering additive and was used for the deposition of a novel SiC membrane layer onto a SiC tubular support by dip-coating. The sintering temperature influence on the structural morphology was studied. Adding aluminum nitrate nonahydrate reduced the sintering temperature of the as-prepared membrane compared to conventional SiC membrane synthesis. Surface morphology, pore size distribution, crystalline structure, and chemical and mechanical stability of the membrane were characterized. The membrane showed excellent corrosion resistance in acidic and basic medium for 30 days with no significant changes in membrane properties. The pure water permeance of the membrane was measured as 2252 L h−1 m−2 bar−1. Lastly, the final membrane with 0.35 µm mean pore size showed high removal of oil droplets (99.7%) in emulsified oil-in-water with outstanding permeability. Hence, the new SiC membrane is promising for several industrial applications in the field of wastewater treatment.