With federal incentives calling for widespread reductions in greenhouse gas emissions over the next few decades, the power sector is in dire need of cost effective solutions to minimize carbon dioxide emissions without hindering their efficiency. Amongst the various methods used for the separation of carbon dioxide from gas mixtures, polymer membranes operate by a passive diffusion mechanism that will significantly reduce operating costs when compared to other methods such as physical adsorption or cryogenic distillation. However, separating carbon dioxide from gas mixtures that are roughly 75 percent nitrogen using polymer membranes remains a grand challenge due to their similar molecular size, kinetic diameters of 3.30 Å and 3.64 Å respectively. We present polymer membranes fabricated from high molecular weight, addition-type polynorbornenes that were functionalized with CO2-philic pendant groups to enhance the diffusion of CO2 gas molecules while hindering the diffusion of nitrogen. These polymer membranes exhibit excellent CO2/N2 selectivity, can be recycled due to their excellent solubility in common organic solvents, and are integral in the design of more complex membrane materials

Development and characterization of advanced gas separation membranes using vinyl-added polynorbornenes bearing CO2-philic functionalities

251st National Meeting (2016)

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