CO₂ Capture from Coal-Derived Power Plants. Growing evidence indicates that man-made emissions of greenhouse gases, principally CO₂, are contributing to global climate change. The bulk of these CO₂ emissions are caused by the combustion of fossil fuels for power production. One approach to controlling CO₂ emissions to the atmosphere is to capture the CO₂ from the post-combustion flue gas or the pre-combustion syngas at the power plants for utilization or sequestration. The key to enabling sustainable power production is a technology that can capture CO₂ from the mixtures with N₂ and H₂ at a low-cost and energy-efficient manner. We are pursuing two approaches to address this challenge. First, we aim to design and engineer CO₂-philic polymers with high CO₂ permeability and high CO₂/N₂ and CO₂/H₂ selectivity. Second, we plan to develop sorption-enhanced mixed matrix membranes containing H₂-philic nanomaterials to achieve high H₂ permeability and high H₂/CO₂ selectivity.

Fluorinated Polymers for Membrane Gas Separation. Development of high performance polymer materials for energy efficient membrane separation is often hampered by their deteriorated separation performance when made into industrial thin film composite membranes operating in the presence of strongly plasticizing components such as heavy hydrocarbons. Recently, perfluoropolymers attract significant interests, because of their superior stability against aging and plasticization. The objective of this program is to develop a fundamental, molecular-based mechanistic understanding of the effect of fluorination on the polymer thin film stability against aging and hydrocarbon-induced plasticization, and apply the guidelines to design a new generation of high performance membrane polymers for practical CO₂ /CH₄ and C₃H₆/C₃H₈ separations.