Syed Zaidi

By Syed Javaid Zaidi and Farid Fadhillah

Membrane‐based desalination is the fastest growing technology in the area of desalination. Reverse osmosis (RO) and nanofiltration (NF) have been established in the last couple of decades; meanwhile, forward osmosis (FO) has begun to find its own place in the field of desalination. Typical commercial polyamide (PA) thin film composite (TFC) membrane has been mostly used in those membrane processes, but it has no drawback. Recently, a versatile, robust technique in preparing ultra‐thin films, so‐called layer‐by‐layer assembly (LbL), was adopted in fabrication of desalination membrane. This chapter highlights the most important literatures in the application of LbL assembly for preparing RO, NF and FO membranes, the obstacles and future works, which are essential for those who wish to work in the field.

Part of the book: Desalination

By Sajeda A. Al-Saydeh and Syed Javaid Zaidi

Greenhouse gases mitigation is one of most important challenges facing societies nowadays. Therefore, the way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions should be using carbon free sources that do not generate extra CO2 to the atmosphere. However, there is a great potential in energy carriers and other materials from CO2, with many challenges to overcome. It has been suggested that the reduction of CO2 and conversion to renewable fuels and valuable chemicals may be considered as a promising solution to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions. This chapter discusses the recent developments and remaining challenges of CO2 utilization for the efficient production of methanol. This includes novel technologies, approaches, and current barriers for the conversion of CO2 to methanol through heterogeneous catalysis, homogenous catalysis, electrochemical, photochemical, and photoelectrochemical conversion, which will contribute to the economic growth and mitigate the hazardous emissions for cleaner environment. A review of various state-of-the-art technologies for CO2 conversion to methanol was carried out aiming to establish the advances in this area and present an overview of the recent research trend for future development of new ideas for CO2 reduction into methanol in a large scale.

Part of the book: Carbon Dioxide Chemistry, Capture and Oil Recovery