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Profile photo of Ronny Berndtsson

Ronny Berndtsson

Professor, Dep Director, MECW Dep Scientific Coordinator

Profile photo of Ronny Berndtsson

Production of Graphene Membranes from Rice Husk Biomass Waste for Improved Desalination

Author

  • Makpal Seitzhanova
  • Seitkhan Azat
  • Mukhtar Yeleuov
  • Azamat Taurbekov
  • Zulkhair Mansurov
  • Erlan Doszhanov
  • Ronny Berndtsson

Summary, in English

Inexpensive and efficient desalination is becoming increasingly important due to dwindling freshwater resources in view of climate change and population increase. Improving desalination techniques of brackish water using graphene-based materials has the possibility to revolutionize freshwater production and treatment. At the same time, graphene matter can be cheaply mass-produced from biowaste materials. In view of this, graphene material was obtained from a four-step production approach starting from rice husk (RH), including pre-carbonation, desilication, chemical activation, and exfoliation. The results showed that the produced samples contained a mixture of graphene layers and amorphous carbon. The activation ratio of 1:5 for carbonized RH and potassium hydroxide (KOH), respectively, provided higher graphene content than the 1:4 ratio of the same components, while the number of active layers remained unaffected. Further treatment with H
2O
2 did not affect the graphene content and exfoliation of the amorphous carbon. Preparation of the graphene material by the NIPS technique and vacuum filtration displayed different physicochemical characteristics of the obtained membranes. However, the membranes' main desalination function might be related more to adsorption rather than size exclusion. In any case, the desalination properties of the different graphene material types were tested on 35 g/L saltwater samples containing NaCl, KCl, MgCl
2, CaSO
4, and MgSO
4. The produced graphene materials efficiently reduced the salt content by up to 95%. Especially for the major constituent NaCl, the removal efficiency was high.

Department/s

  • Centre for Advanced Middle Eastern Studies (CMES)
  • MECW: The Middle East in the Contemporary World
  • Division of Water Resources Engineering
  • LTH Profile Area: Water

Publishing year

2024-01-19

Language

English

Publication/Series

Nanomaterials

Volume

14

Issue

2

Document type

Journal article

Publisher

MDPI AG

Topic

  • Water Treatment

Status

Published

ISBN/ISSN/Other

  • ISSN: 2079-4991