Dehydration of toluene by pervaporation using a composite membrane

In the present work , the variation of the water content remaining in the retentate for dehydrating toluene at various operating temperatures in the 40-65 c range by pervaporation using a composite membrane with a top layer of polyvinyl alcohol PVA on a porous polyacrylonitril PAN support has been studied. the feed flow rate and pressure for all runs were kept constant in 1.11/min and 3 mmHg, respectively . the membrane has been found to be selective towards water in comparison to toluene as the final content of water in feed may be experimentally reduced from 150 ppm to just below 50ppm in the retentate. also results indicate that by increasing temperature , the permeate water flux and total flux increased . therefore , increasing temperature enhances membrane performance in dehydration of toluene by pervaporation.

Keywords:

pervaporation , toluene , dehydration , polyvinyl alcohol.