In this year’s United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP26) held in Glasgow, Scotland, various leading countries have put forward their commitment to net zero emissions. Water resource regeneration and carbon dioxide reduction have once again become important guidelines to combat global warming. Also, in 2021, while the world is under the threat of the raging epidemic, Taiwan experienced its worst drought in 56 years, which might directly affect the country’s electronic industry. If this water crisis continues, it might also cause a major blow on the global scale, given that Taiwan is responsible for more than 60% of the world’s semiconductor industry. If the large amount of organic solvents used in the semiconductor manufacturing process can be recycled and reused, it can not only reduce waste generation, but also achieve economic recycling through valuable solvent recovery. Membrane-based organic solvent nano filtration technology was specifically designed to achieve this. However, NF generally uses polymeric membranes that are usually soluble in organic solvents, which limits their application in organic solvent nanofiltration. Therefore, in order to effectively solve the above-mentioned problems, we propose a comprehensive evaluation of the solvent-resistant graphene-based responsive membranes for organic solvent nanofiltration, breaking the traditional membrane design and formation methods.

We aim to develop a new and advanced membrane design strategy that will combine stimuli-responsive materials with a two-dimensional material that is solvent resistant and is expected to exceed the limit of the existing traditional materials. The membranes will be used for the recovery of mixed organic solvents with complex composition through smart response control. The project is expected to take three phases. The first phases will focus on the structural design and modification of responsive graphene composite membranes, and explore the interface compatibility and self-polarization bases between two-dimensional materials and various responsive polymers. The goal for the second phase is to explore the optimal performance test of solvent-resistant graphene-based responsive membranes in organic solvent nanofiltration, and to investigate the microstructure and electrochemical properties of graphene composite films. For the third phase, it is planned to use the responsive graphene composite membranes to intelligently control and separate the multi-component organic solvents, examine the separation efficiency of response parameters, and build an information platform for the separation of these mixed organic solvents.