Polyimide based mixed matrix nanofiltration membrane for refining palm oil

The purification of vegetable oil is an important process to obtain purified vegetable oil for various applications. However, conventional processes in vegetable oil purification, such as deacidification, require a huge amount of energy which is not only costly, but also contributes to a high rate o...

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Main Author: Lim, Ki Min
Format: Thesis
Language:English
Published: 2022
Subjects:
Online Access:http://eprints.utm.my/100353/1/LimKiMinPMJIIT2022.pdf
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author Lim, Ki Min
author_facet Lim, Ki Min
author_sort Lim, Ki Min
collection ePrints
description The purification of vegetable oil is an important process to obtain purified vegetable oil for various applications. However, conventional processes in vegetable oil purification, such as deacidification, require a huge amount of energy which is not only costly, but also contributes to a high rate of carbon footprints. To improve the current state of purification, the capability of membrane technology in purifying vegetable oil was investigated. The main objective of this study is to investigate the potential of polyimide-based mixed matrix membrane (MMM) in refining palm oil by nanofiltration. To achieve the objective, preliminary investigations on the performance of commercially available membranes were made. Subsequently, polyimide-based MMM with different additives loadings were fabricated and characterized. Additionally, membrane transport models were used to describe and predict the membrane separation process and a suitable multistage configuration was also proposed. The structural and physical characteristics of the fabricated membranes were studied. The separation performances of the fabricated membranes were investigated by using a dead-end stirred cell and ethyl acetate as the diluting solvent for palm oil. From the membrane characterization, it was found that MMM with 0.5wt% of β-cyclodextrin functionalized multi-walled carbon nanotubes (βCD-fMWCNT) achieves the highest separation of palmitic acid from the feed diluted palm oil at 3.84 LMH/bar. The rejection of palmitic acid was found to be 60% and tocopherol, carotene and triglyceride at 94.43%, 98.74%, and 95.18% respectively. The membrane separation process was found to be best described by using the Solution-Diffusion model. Additionally, a theoretical study by using different multistage configurations found that the separation process can be further improved. The proposed multistage configuration was able to yield triglyceride with 99.28% purity with only 9.8% of oil loss in the purified permeate stream with a 41% of solvent recovery rate. Therefore, from this study, it is proven that membrane separation technology is a promising purification alternative and mixed matrix polyimide membrane has the potential in improving the conventional palm oil purification process.
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spelling utm.eprints-1003532023-04-13T02:19:26Z http://eprints.utm.my/100353/ Polyimide based mixed matrix nanofiltration membrane for refining palm oil Lim, Ki Min Q Science (General) The purification of vegetable oil is an important process to obtain purified vegetable oil for various applications. However, conventional processes in vegetable oil purification, such as deacidification, require a huge amount of energy which is not only costly, but also contributes to a high rate of carbon footprints. To improve the current state of purification, the capability of membrane technology in purifying vegetable oil was investigated. The main objective of this study is to investigate the potential of polyimide-based mixed matrix membrane (MMM) in refining palm oil by nanofiltration. To achieve the objective, preliminary investigations on the performance of commercially available membranes were made. Subsequently, polyimide-based MMM with different additives loadings were fabricated and characterized. Additionally, membrane transport models were used to describe and predict the membrane separation process and a suitable multistage configuration was also proposed. The structural and physical characteristics of the fabricated membranes were studied. The separation performances of the fabricated membranes were investigated by using a dead-end stirred cell and ethyl acetate as the diluting solvent for palm oil. From the membrane characterization, it was found that MMM with 0.5wt% of β-cyclodextrin functionalized multi-walled carbon nanotubes (βCD-fMWCNT) achieves the highest separation of palmitic acid from the feed diluted palm oil at 3.84 LMH/bar. The rejection of palmitic acid was found to be 60% and tocopherol, carotene and triglyceride at 94.43%, 98.74%, and 95.18% respectively. The membrane separation process was found to be best described by using the Solution-Diffusion model. Additionally, a theoretical study by using different multistage configurations found that the separation process can be further improved. The proposed multistage configuration was able to yield triglyceride with 99.28% purity with only 9.8% of oil loss in the purified permeate stream with a 41% of solvent recovery rate. Therefore, from this study, it is proven that membrane separation technology is a promising purification alternative and mixed matrix polyimide membrane has the potential in improving the conventional palm oil purification process. 2022 Thesis NonPeerReviewed application/pdf en http://eprints.utm.my/100353/1/LimKiMinPMJIIT2022.pdf Lim, Ki Min (2022) Polyimide based mixed matrix nanofiltration membrane for refining palm oil. PhD thesis, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, Malaysia-Japan International Institute of Technology. http://dms.library.utm.my:8080/vital/access/manager/Repository/vital:151001
spellingShingle Q Science (General)
Lim, Ki Min
Polyimide based mixed matrix nanofiltration membrane for refining palm oil
title Polyimide based mixed matrix nanofiltration membrane for refining palm oil
title_full Polyimide based mixed matrix nanofiltration membrane for refining palm oil
title_fullStr Polyimide based mixed matrix nanofiltration membrane for refining palm oil
title_full_unstemmed Polyimide based mixed matrix nanofiltration membrane for refining palm oil
title_short Polyimide based mixed matrix nanofiltration membrane for refining palm oil
title_sort polyimide based mixed matrix nanofiltration membrane for refining palm oil
topic Q Science (General)
url http://eprints.utm.my/100353/1/LimKiMinPMJIIT2022.pdf
work_keys_str_mv AT limkimin polyimidebasedmixedmatrixnanofiltrationmembraneforrefiningpalmoil