Molecular Modelling of Carbon-based Membranes for Desalination

Water scarcity is one of the major resource crisis worldwide. Only 3% of Earth's water is fresh and suitable for human consumption. Given the abundance of salty water from seas and oceans, there is a need to purify such water using economical and environmentally friendly processes. Seawater desalination has long been practiced on this issue. The most widely used commercial desalination techniques are reverse osmosis (RO), electrodialysis, and nanofiltration. They are all energy-and capital-intensive. Nanoporous membranes promise to be more efficient than the existing technology and may yield savings in energy consumption during RO operations. Experimental and simulation studies manifest that membranes having a nanosized pore network can operate as molecular sieves, likely letting only the water molecules pass through the cavities while excluding the ions of the solvent. Carbon-based membranes ...