Abstract

Polymeric membrane cascades have demonstrated their technical and economic viability for hydrogen peroxide ultrapurification. Nevertheless, these membranes suffer from fast degradation under such oxidative conditions. Alternative membranes with higher chemical resistance could improve the ultrapurification process. Therefore, this work presents the preliminary techno-economic analysis of two non-commercial membranes (a ceramic one and a hybrid organosilica one). This analysis is complemented with further research regarding the competitiveness of these alternative membranes compared to polymeric ones. The results confirm the technical viability for both membranes, but the ceramic membrane is not appropriate when Na is considered as the limiting impurity (because it has too low rejection coefficient). The economic viability of the proposed ultrapurification processes is also probed, but not under competitive conditions, as the polyamide membrane appears to be the optimal choice. Nonetheless, improvements in the permeability of the hybrid membrane (an increase in the membrane permeability by a factor of 10) or the rejection performance of the ceramic membrane (an increase in the reflection coefficient above 0.85) could transform these non-commercial membranes into the most profitable alternative. (C) 2017 Institution of Chemical Engineers. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.