Synthesis and Evaluation of Polysulfone/Polyaniline Nanocomposite Reverse Osmosis Membranes Using Sodium Butyl Sulfate

The most prevalent problems of the desalination process are the clogging of membranes and their deterioration utilising free chlorine. As a substratum for the active polyamide layer, a mixture of nanocomposite polysulfone/polyaniline was produced. In this work, the use of a simple chemical oxidative polymerisation process was used for nano polyaniline emeraldine salt. In the presence of sodium butyl sulphate, it has been added to the substratum layer of polysulfone (PS) as a hydrophilic agent to increase the composite membrane reverse osmosis characteristics. Nano-particle membranes with XRD, EDX, FT-IR, SEM, particle size distribution and contact angle were studied in both non-modified and modified polyaniline. The membrane efficiency has been assessed using a crossflow filtering device in terms of water flow and salt rejection. The results demonstrated that the water permeability of the nano-composite membrane (65 L/m2/h) was substantially superior to that of the control membrane (56 L/m2/h) without any significant change in the percentage of salt repulsion. Bovine serum albumin (BSA) as fouling model has been studied and sodium hypochlorite is used for the resistance of membranes to biofouling and chlorine degradation. Due to significant electrostatic repulsion between polyaniline PANI and BSA, the modified membrane was more resistant to biofouling and chlorine assault. Increased performance in reverse osmosis of a thin film composite was achieved using the polysulfonepolyaniline nano-composite substrate produced.