Inorganic membrane science and technology is an attractive field of membrane separation technology, which has been dominated by polymer membranes. Recently, the inorganic membrane has been undergoing rapid development and innovation. Inorganic membranes have the advantage of resisting harsh chemical cleaning, high temperature and wear resistance, high chemical stability, long lifetime, and autoclavable. All of these outstanding properties made inorganic membranes good candidates to be used for water treatment and desalination applications. This paper is a state of the art review on the synthesis, development, and application of different inorganic membranes for water and wastewater treatment. The inorganic membranes reviewed in this paper include liquid membranes, dynamic membranes, various ceramic membranes, carbon based membranes, silica membranes, and zeolite membranes. A brief description of the different synthesis routes for the development of inorganic membranes for application in water industry is given and each synthesis rout is critically reviewed and compared. Thereafter, the recent studies on different application of inorganic membrane and their properties for water treatment and desalination in literature are critically summarized. It was reported that inorganic membranes despite their high synthesis cost, showed very promising results with high flux, full salt rejection, and very low or no fouling.

Organic solvent nanofiltration (OSN) is a membrane separation method that has gained much interest due to its promising ability to offer an energy-lean alternative for traditional thermal separation methods. Industrial acceptance, however, is held back by the slow process of membrane screening based on trial and error for each solute-solvent couple to be separated. Such time-consuming screening is necessary due to the absence of predictive models, caused by a lack of fundamental understanding of the complex separation mechanism complicated by the wide variety of solute and solvent properties, and the importance of all mutual solute-solvent-membrane affinities and competing interactions. Recently, data-driven approaches have gained a lot of attention due to their unprecedented predictive power, significantly outperforming traditional mechanistic models. In this review, we give an overview of both mechanistic models and the recent advances in data-driven modeling. In addition to other reviews, we want to emphasize the coherence of all mechanistic models and discuss their relevance in an increasingly data-driven field. We reflect on the use of data in the field of OSN and its compliance with the FAIR principles, and we give an overview of the state of the art of data-driven models in OSN. The review can serve as inspiration for any further modeling activities, both mechanistic and data-driven, in the field.

This study presents the first combined techno-economic and environmental analysis of IPA dehydration using HybSi^® membranes across three configurations, offering a low-emission alternative to conventional azeotropic distillation. The processes are simulated in Aspen Plus, and include two hybrid separation processes (i.e., distillation–pervaporation and distillation–pervaporation–distillation) and one standalone pervaporation process. The pervaporation module uses data from experiments that were performed using HybSi^® AR membranes at 130 °C and two vacuum pressures (20 and 50 mbar). The separation processes were systematically compared using a comprehensive set of performance indicators covering technical, economic, and environmental aspects. A new cost-efficiency metric, COPCO, is introduced, alongside updated modeling under 2024 market conditions. The isopropanol recovery and water selectivity were >99.5% and >98.7%, respectively, in all pervaporation-based processes. It was found that the hybrid distillation–pervaporation process resulted in a 42% reduction in the levelized cost of the benchmark azeotropic distillation process, while standalone pervaporation resulted in a 38% reduction. The CO₂ footprint was also reduced significantly in all cases, up to 86% in the case of standalone pervaporation compared to azeotropic distillation. The COPCO analysis revealed that the distillation–pervaporation configuration offers the highest cost-efficiency among the evaluated systems. Sensitivity analysis revealed that feed flow rate, average water flux, membrane module price, membrane lifetime, and steam price significantly impact the levelized cost. Lower vacuum pressure and feed water near the azeotropic composition enhance economic performance.