JCEJAB Journal of Chemical Engineering of Japan, Vol. 33, No. 2, pp. 333-336, 2000

Application of a Zeolite A Membrane to Reverse Osmosis Process

IZUMI KUMAKIRI, TAKEO YAMAGUCHI AND SHIN-ICHI NAKAO

Department of Chemical System Engineering, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo 113-8656, Japan

Keywords: Zeolite Membrane, Reverse Osmosis (RO), Pervaporation (PV), Liquid Separation

The reverse osmosis process needs no phase transformation during separation, and thus it has a po-tential in saving energy for liquid mixture separations. Application of reverse osmosis to organic liquid is limited, owing to the lower stability of polymer membranes against organic liquid. Zeolites are inor-ganic materials having durability against organic liquid and heat, and they show good separation ability in pervaporation. In this study, zeolite membrane was firstly applied to the reverse osmosis process. Zeolite A membrane, having thickness around 5 m, showed 0.44 rejection from 10wt% ethanol water mixture. The membrane was stable to applied pressures up to 50 kgf cm ^2 .