Livestock-derived biogas upgrading to biofuel using high-performance thin-film composite membranes

This project aims to further membrane technology in the application of livestock-derived biogas upgrading to biofuel. Currently the high costs of traditional upgrading processes (e.g. amine scrubbing) discourage many livestock farmers from converting manure to biogas and renewable natural gas (RNG). This not only causes missed revenue diversification opportunities and hinders sustainable energy contributions but also pushes farmers towards biogas flaring increasing greenhouse gas emissions. Ultimately these prohibitive costs maintain our dependence on fossil fuels. Membrane technologies hold the potential to significantly reduce upgrading costs due to their continuous operations and minimal heat input requirements. Yet the adoption of these technologies is hindered by current membrane materials' limitations such as low gas permeance low selectivity aging and instability under plasticizing conditions. ChemFinity aims to address these material challenges by pioneering the development of high- performance thin-film composite membranes. These membranes are tailored specifically for CO2/CH4 separations in livestock-derived biogas upgrading. Leveraging advanced materials and fabrication methods our proposed work is to develop technology that potentially deliver separation efficiencies 2-5 times superior to existing commercial membranes while ensuring consistent performance even under prolonged operations and high CO2 pressures. By demonstrating these unprecedented performances our cutting-edge gas separation membrane technology can substantially reduce operational upgrading costs by over 35% when compared with conventional methods. This cost reduction furthers the economic viability of converting manure to RNG but also can create a pivotal shift towards a more sustainable and competitively priced bio-based RNG.