Membrane separation for oxygen enrichment

Although polymeric membranes have been sometimes employed for producing oxygen enriched air, the performance is not always enough to compete with conventional technology like a cryogenic distillation. This article introduced present state of membrane investigations such as polymeric, inorganic, mixed matrix and facilitated transport ones. Especially carbon molecular sieve membranes are promising candidates of next generation membranes. Economical evaluation prevailed that membranes whose ideal separation factor of around 10 should have O2 permeance at least 200 GPU based on membrane replacement of 5 years and the cost of 5000 yen/m2.