Preparation and gas permeation properties of carbon molecular sieve membranes based on sulfonated phenolic resin

Effects of pyrolysis and preparation conditions on the gas permeation properties of pyrolytic membranes derived from sulfonated phenolic resin were investigated. Pyrolysis temperature, dip-coating conditions and coating/pyrolysis (C/P) cycle had significant influence on the gas permeation properties of pyrolytic membranes. Membrane obtained under optimum preparation conditions exhibited O2 permeance of 30 GPU and ideal O2/N2 separation factor of 12 at 35 °C, which are comparable to the O2/N2 separation performances of carbon molecular sieve (CMS) membranes on the upper-bound line in the plots of permeance versus selectivity. N2 adsorption and desorption at 77 K suggested that the pore structures of CMS membranes pyrolyzed around 500 °C seemed to be made up of interconnected pores with different size and shape.