Reactive modification of PVC membranes for the improved performance

Poly vinyl chloride (PVC) was chemically modified, and used for ultrafiltration to analyze the performance. Nonsolvent induced phase separation (NIPS) method was used to prepare membranes. The neat PVC membrane was casted and used as a control membrane. Modified membrane was prepared by reacting PVC with ethanolamine (EA) in the casting solution (labeled as CM-PVC). Pure water permeability (PWP) was evaluated by measuring pure water flux. Humic acid was used as model foulant solute to analyze flux and rejection ability of membranes. Flux and rejection data of neat and modified membranes were compared to prove the improvement in the filtration performance. The experimental results showed that for PVC and CM-PVC, PWP was calculated to be ~64 and ~143 L/m2.h, respectively, and the rejection of humic acid was found to be 98% and 100%, respectively. TGA was carried out to analyze the effect of chemical modification on the thermal stability of polymer. FT-IR analysis was another characterization technique used for the comparative study.