One-step facile fabrication of sustainable cellulose membrane with superhydrophobicity via a sol-gel strategy for efficient oil/water separation

Abstract With the rapid development of petrochemical industry, oily wastewater pose a serious threat to environment and human safety. Recently, superhydrophobic and superoleophilic materials have received considerable interest due to their high selective oil/water separation. Nevertheless, facile fabrication, stability, eco-friendly, sustainable and low cost materials are still a great challenge. Here, a sustainable superhydrophobic cellulose membrane (SOCM) is prepared via one-step facile sol-gel strategy for efficient oil/water separation. The superhydrophobicity is endowed with cellulose membrane (CM) by one-step micro/nano hierarchical structures construction and low-surface-energy chemical modification from tetraethyl orthosilicate (TEOS) and hexadecyltrimethoxysilane (HDTMS) hydrolysis and polycondensation. The SOCM shows high separation efficiencies (above 98%) for various oil/water mixtures. Importantly, the SOCM displays well environmental (acid, alkali and salt-resistance) and mechanical durability (tape peeling and scratch-resistance) and remarkable reusability (at least 10 times). The merits of facile fabrication, stability, eco-friendly, sustainable and low cost make SOCM a promising candidate material for large-scale application in oil/water separation.