2014-10-202014-10-202014-07-13978-0-692-38220-2ICES-2014-084http://hdl.handle.net/2346/59641Tucson, ArizonaThe 44th International Conference on Environmental Systems was held in Tuscon, Arizona, USA on 13 July 2014 through 17 July 2014.Osamu Okada, Renaissance Energy Research Corporation, JapanMasaaki Teramoto, Renaissance Energy Research Corporation, JapanTamotsu Nonouchi, Renaissance Energy Research Corporation, JapanNobuaki Hanai, Renaissance Energy Research Corporation, JapanJunya Miyata, Renaissance Energy Research Corporation, JapanYasato Kiyohara, Renaissance Energy Research Corporation, JapanMasato Sakurai, Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, JapanFor the CO2 control in the space station, attention has been mainly paid to the adsorption method. One of the alternatives to this method is the separation using membranes, which is a simple continuous system with low energy consumption and no capacity limit since CO2 absorption at the feed side of the membrane and desorption at the permeate side occur simultaneously. In order to apply membranes for the CO2 removal in space stations and also in space suits, development of membranes with extremely high CO2 selectivity over O2 and N2 is required for minimizing the O2 and N2 losses. In the present work, we developed several types of CO2 selective facilitated transport membranes. These are gel-type membranes supported on microporous membranes. The gel layer contains a CO2 carrier, which enhances CO2 permeability, and also an additive, which improves the permeation characteristics. Typical membrane performances observed at low CO2 partial pressures (0.7kPa) and room temperature are as follows. CO2 permeance: 1.23104  1.71104 Ncm3 cm-2 s-1 cmHg-1 (4.1105  5.7105 mol m-2 s-1 kPa-1), CO2/N2 selectivity: 570013700, which is much larger than those reported so far. CO2/O2 selectivity was about half the CO2/N2 selectivity. The performance of membrane module, in which the developed membranes are supposed to be used, was estimated when the module is applied to space stations and space suits. It was found that the mol fraction of CO2 recovered from the permeate side of the membrane is higher than 0.96 (dry basis), which suggests very small O2 and N2 losses. When this membrane is applied to a space suit, the membrane area and volume of the membrane module required for removing CO2 at the rate 2.23 kg/day were approximately estimated as 31.6 m2 and 16 L, respectively. The membrane module works also for removing water vapor from space suits.application/pdfengPresentation