Development of Novel Fouling-Resistant Hollow Fibre Nanocomposite Membrane Augmented with Iron Oxide Nanoparticles for Efficient Rejection of Bisphenol A from Water: Fouling, Permeability, and Mechanism Studies

Recently, frequent discharge of water-ladened emerging organic pollutants such as Bisphenol A has elicited serious concern due to its pernicious effects on public health and the ecological environment. In this study, hematite nanoparticles (Fe2O3) were synthesized via the sol-gel auto-combustion technique and incorporated as a nanofiller to fabricate a PVDF-PEG nanocomposite hollow fibre membrane with enhanced antifouling properties. A series of membranes comprising various loadings (1.0-2.0 wt%) of Fe2O3 NPs were fabricated through the phase inversion technique and thoroughly analyzed. The developed Fe2O3-membrane fibres were thoroughly characterized. The performance of the membrane fibres was investigated through permeation flux, BPA rejection, as well as antifouling characteristics. Based on the results obtained, the resultant nanocomposite membrane fibres exhibited superior performance in comparison with the pristine fibre. Also, the nanocomposite membrane with 1.5 wt%-Fe2O3 NPs exhibited remarkable performance with - 43.7 mV, 56.3o, 191.85 L/m(2) h, 86.7%, and 12% of negatively charged zeta potential, least contact angle, water permeation flux, BPA rejection, and minimum weight loss, respectively. Besides, the 1.5 wt-Fe2O3 NPs nanocomposite membrane demonstrated superior antifouling performance after the third filtration, accomplishing a higher percent of FRR (77.35%) along with RFR of 21.29%, respectively. Hence, based on the performance of the fabricated hollow-fibre membranes loaded with Fe2O3 NPs, efficient antifouling membranes was achieved which can be suitably applied in the purification of industrial wastewater.