SBIR Phase I: Sub-10 nm protective coating on high-temperature hydrogen purification membrane

该小型企业创新研究第一阶段项目将开发用于高温氢气纯化的薄膜保护膜。备受期待的氢经济需要一种稳健且经济的氢纯化和生产方法。用于氢气纯化的最先进的膜材料有一个主要的缺点？对杂质，特别是硫的耐受性低。 解决方案是超薄保护涂层。新的涂层膜在高温下将具有高的氢选择性和渗透性，并将具有高度的抗硫性。为了确保该项目的成功，制定了三个目标：1）证明在高温和高压下的膜性能，2）证明膜与进料流组分（如二氧化碳，一氧化碳，水和硫）的稳定性，以及3）证明在热循环下的耐热性。 预计最终的膜将超过99.5%纯度的高氢通量，对硫（100 ppm）和二氧化碳的耐受性以及潜在工业应用所需的高稳定性的目标。该项目更广泛的影响/商业潜力将是其客户，公众和科学界的众多利益。由于其高性能、热稳定性、对污染物的鲁棒性、成本节约和最少的维护，新的膜技术将在许多应用中提供真正的价值主张。 这种膜的成功将有助于实现期待已久的氢经济，为氢工业的用户创造市场吸引力。该技术可容易地应用于炼油厂和煤气化的氢气纯化。所提出的膜系统对其他市场也将是非常宝贵的，例如用于运输的氢气、用于石化产品的氢气分离、从氨工厂中的氨吹扫气体中捕获氢气、用于合成气的氢气/一氧化碳比率调节以及从吹扫流中回收氢气。 该项目的成功将带来更大的社会效益，减少对外国石油的依赖，减少化石燃料使用对环境的影响，并在新兴能源技术方面提供国家竞争优势。 最后，获得的科学认识将有利于相关领域，如催化，半导体，电子和成像工业。

This Small Business Innovation Research Phase I project will develop a thin film protected membrane for high temperature hydrogen purification. The much anticipated hydrogen economy demands a robust and economical method for hydrogen purification and production. The state-of the-art membrane material for hydrogen purification has a major downside ? low tolerance for impurities, sulfur in particular. The solution is an ultra-thin protective coating. The new coated membrane will have high hydrogen selectivity and permeance at elevated temperatures and will be highly resistant to sulfur. To ensure the success of this project, three objectives are laid out: 1) demonstrate membrane performance under elevated temperatures and pressures, 2) demonstrate membrane stability with feedstream components such as carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, water, and sulfur, and 3) demonstrate thermal resistance under thermal cycling. The resulting membrane is expected to exceed the goal of having a high hydrogen flux with 99.5% purity, tolerance to sulfur (100 ppm) and carbon dioxide, and the high stability required for potential industrial applications.The broader impact/commercial potential of this project will be the numerous benefits to its customers, the general public and the scientific community. The new membrane technology will offer a genuine value proposition in a number of applications, due to its high performance, thermal stability, robustness against contaminants, cost savings and minimal maintenance. The success of this proposed membrane will assist in enabling the much-awaited hydrogen economy, creating market pull for users in the hydrogen industry. This technology can readily be applied to hydrogen purification for oil refineries and for coal gasification. The proposed membrane system will also be invaluable to other markets, such as hydrogen for transportation, hydrogen separation for petrochemicals, hydrogen capture from ammonia purge gas in ammonia plants, hydrogen/carbon monoxide ratio adjustment for syngas, and hydrogen recovery from purge stream. The success of this project will have the larger societal benefits of reducing the dependence on foreign oil, reducing the environmental impacts of fossil fuel use, and provide a national competitive advantage in emerging energy technologies. Finally, the scientific understanding gained will benefit related fields, such as catalysis, and the semiconductor, electronics, and imaging industries.