Search results for ""Author Enrico Drioli""

Desalination is imperative to mitigate the global water scarcity as it produces drinking water from unpotable water. Currently, reverse osmosis membrane processes are widely used and account for 60% of desalination plants globally as they have lower energy requirements than other techniques, such as thermal desalination. Another promising alternative to desalination is membrane distillation (MD), which has been highlighted as one of the most promising and cost-effective desalination technologies over the last five decades. MD is a thermally driven desalination process that uses microporous and hydrophobic membranes through which only vapor can pass. Because non-volatile ions cannot pass through the membrane, MD theoretically achieves 100% salt rejection. In addition, MD is superior to other techniques as it is conducted at relatively low temperature and pressure, and is less sensitive to the feed concentration. MD is a desalination process that uses the vapor pressure difference between the feed and permeate as the driving force through the membranes. Over 2,800 scientific publications appeared in Web of Science as of September 2019 (over 400 just in 2019) describing the current state of development and potential future applications of MD. Although these publications provide excellent knowledge regarding MD, they are rather fragmented, and it is difficult to gain a complete overview of the basic principles and functions of membranes for MD configurations and their application to real plants. In this book, we introduce MD from the invention of this technique to the recent developments in membranes and processes. The membrane materials and configurations of MD processes are systematically discussed, along with an introduction to real pilot plants that have been installed and tested in the field, and an economic analysis of MD. The objective of this book is to provide a short, but reasonably comprehensive, introduction to MD to graduate students and persons with an engineering or natural science background, to gain a basic understanding of MD, and the associated materials, configurations, and applications, without studying a large number of different reference books.

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Membranes already have important applications in artificial organs, the processing of biotechnological products, food manufacture, waste water treatment, and seawater desalination. Their uses in gaseous mixture separations are, however, far from achieving their full potential. Separation of air components, natural gas dehumidification and sweeting, separation and recovery of CO2 from biogas, and H2 from refinery gases are all examples of current industrial applications. The use of membranes for reducing the greenhouse effect and improving energy efficiency has also been suggested. New process intensification strategies in the petrochemical industry have opened up another growth area for gas separation membrane systems and membrane reactors. This two volume set presents the state-of-the-art in membrane engineering for the separation of gases. It addresses future developments in carbon capture and utilization, H2 production and purification, and O2/N2 separation. Topics covered include the: applications of membrane gas separation in the petrochemical industry; implementation of membrane processes for post-combustion capture; commercial applications of membranes in gas separations; simulation of membrane systems for CO2 capture; design and development of membrane reactors for industrial applications; Pd-based membranes in hydrogen production; modelling and simulation of membrane reactors for hydrogen production and purification; novel hybrid membrane/pressure swing adsorption process for gas separation; molecular dynamics as a new tool for membrane design, and physical aging of membranes for gas separations. Volume 2 looks at problems combined with membrane reactors.

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Membranes already have important applications in artificial organs, the processing of biotechnological products, food manufacture, waste water treatment, and seawater desalination. Their uses in gaseous mixture separations are, however, far from achieving their full potential. Separation of air components, natural gas dehumidification and sweeting, separation and recovery of CO2 from biogas, and H2 from refinery gases are all examples of current industrial applications. The use of membranes for reducing the greenhouse effect and improving energy efficiency has also been suggested. New process intensification strategies in the petrochemical industry have opened up another growth area for gas separation membrane systems and membrane reactors. This two volume set presents the state-of-the-art in membrane engineering for the separation of gases. It addresses future developments in carbon capture and utilization, H2 production and purification, and O2/N2 separation. Topics covered include the: applications of membrane gas separation in the petrochemical industry; implementation of membrane processes for post-combustion capture; commercial applications of membranes in gas separations; simulation of membrane systems for CO2 capture; design and development of membrane reactors for industrial applications; Pd-based membranes in hydrogen production; modelling and simulation of membrane reactors for hydrogen production and purification; novel hybrid membrane/pressure swing adsorption process for gas separation; molecular dynamics as a new tool for membrane design, and physical aging of membranes for gas separations. Volume 1 focuses predominantly on problems relating to membranes.

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Elaborating on recent and future developments in the field of membrane engineering, Volume 1 focuses on new membrane materials which have recently emerged in gas separation. Covering graphene/graphene oxide based membranes, PIMs, thermally rearranged membranes, and new mixed matrix membranes, alongside membrane pilot plant trials of gas separation, such as CO2 from flue gas and biogas, as well as a cost analysis of competitive membrane and hybrid systems, this book provides a comprehensive account. Together with Volume 2, these books form an innovative reference work on membrane engineering and technology in the field of gas separation and gaseous phase membrane reactors.

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