DESIGN AND DEVELOPMENT OF A MEMBRANE TESTCELL WITH UNIFORM MASS-TRANSFER - APPLICATION TO CHARACTERIZATION OF HIGH-FLUX GAS SEPARATION MEMBRANES

This paper describes a novel test cell intended for the characterisati on of high flux flat sheet gas separation membranes, for which the mas s transfer can be determined theoretically. It has the important benef it of uniform mass transfer over the entire membrane. Moreover, the co ncentration of species remains constant over the entire membrane surfa ce. The test cell design, based on an approximate description of the t ransfer phenomena occurring in the geometry, was verified by a numeric al solution of the complete set of equations. Consequently, a test cel l was built and successfully tested by means of mass transfer measurem ents.