Anti-trade-off in dehydration of ethanol by novel PVA/APTEOS hybrid membranes

Novel organic–inorganic hybrid membranes were prepared through sol–gel reaction of poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA) with γ-aminopropyl-triethoxysilane (APTEOS) for pervaporation (PV) separation of ethanol/water mixtures. The membranes were characterized by FTIR, EDX, WXRD and PALS. The amorphous region of the hybrid membranes increased with increasing APTEOS content, and both the free volume and the hydrophilicity of the hybrid membranes increased when APTEOS content was less than 5 wt%. The swelling degree of the hybrid membranes has been restrained in an aqueous solution owing to the formation of hydrogen and covalent bonds in the membrane matrix. Permeation flux increased remarkably with APTEOS content increasing, and water permselectivity increased at the same time, the trade-off between the permeation flux and water permselectivity of the hybrid membranes was broken. The sorption selectivity increased with increasing temperature, and decreased with increasing water content. In addition, the diffusion selectivity and diffusion coefficient of the permeants through the hybrid membranes were investigated. The hybrid membrane containing 5 wt% APTEOS has highest separation factor of 536.7 at 50 °C and permeation flux of 0.0355 kg m−2 h−1 in PV separation of 5 wt% water in the feed.