How Membranes Work – Separation of Nitrogen from the Air

How Membranes Work – Separation of Nitrogen from the Air

The membrane separation of gases is simple in concept. At the heart of technology are polymeric materials extruded into hollow-fiber membrane that allow for the rapid passage of some gases while minimizing the passage of others when applying a pressure gradient across the membrane.

Figure 1 demonstrates the relative rates of common gases with the focus on the separation of oxygen and water vapor from compressed air to provide a high-purity nitrogen product stream. The GENERON® polymer has the best properties for allowing O₂ & H₂O to permeate preferentially through the membrane walls relative to the N2 and inert Ar, resulting in the most efficient air separation membrane performance and lowest unit power consumption for nitrogen generation.

A GENERON® membrane module may contain millions of single hollow-fibers. Compressed feed air is passed down the bores of the fibers at one end of the module with the enriched nitrogen gas exiting from the opposing end. Oxygen and water vapor are selectively removed and vented away from the feed air as it flows to the other end of the module. If the feed gas is supplied to the membranes with pressures greater than 500 PSIG, then a different flow scheme is used: In high-pressure applications, like CO2-Removal from natural gas, the membranes are supplied with the feed gas on the shell-side of the hollow-fibers and the permeate gas containing the “faster” gases are collected inside the bore of the membrane fibers. The GENERON® membranes allow gas separation at pressures up to 1,200 PSIG and are maintaining a history of reliability unmatched in the industry!

GENERON® modules the best available membrane materials with state-of-the-art fiber bundling and the optimum module fabrication methods to provide the most cost effective solution for on-site nitrogen production….and we have over 60 patents to prove it! To view our Nitrogen Membrane Product Line, click here, or to inquire about a nitrogen membrane generator, please click here.