CO₂/CH₄ separation by facilitated transport in amine‐polyethylene glycol mixtures

In this work, the separation of carbon dioxide from methane by reactive liquid membranes consisting of the secondary amines, diethanolamine, and diisopropanolamine in polyethylene glycol with an average molecular weight of 400 was studied. A mathematical model was developed to describe the transport process. This model employs the zwitterion mechanism for the CO₂ amine reaction kinetics. Membrane flux experiments utilizing a flat plate device were carried out to verify the model predictions. It was found that large permeabilities and separations were achieved for low CO₂ feed concentrations. The results also show that DEA based solutions give better separation than DIPA based solutions.