"双碳"目标下膜技术发展的思考

The essence of achieving "carbon emission peak" and "carbon neutrality" is to completely get rid of the dependence of economic and social development on carbon-containing mineral resources. The key solution towards this issue is to develop innovative science and technology. As an efficient and energy-saving generic separation technology, what role can membrane technology play in this process? This paper discusses the important functions of membrane technology in the pivotal technical approaches to realizing "carbon emission peak" and "carbon neutrality" targets from four aspects: zero-carbon energy system reconstruction, low-carbon-process engineering, non-CO₂ gas emission reduction and negative-carbon-system creation. The involved technical approaches mainly included zero-carbon-electricity storage, green hydrogen preparation and utilization, process optimization and energy consumption reduction of current industrial processes, CO₂ and non-CO₂ gas capture, CO₂ conversion and reuse. The recent developments of membrane technology in the relevant fields are analyzed, and the future development directions and goals of the membrane technology in China are prospected. It is anticipated that the large-scale applications of various disruptive membrane technologies in the future could contribute to achieving the two strategic objectives of the lowest renewable energy cost in the world and the minimum price of low-carbon-process engineering, and then provide technical supports for realizing "carbon neutrality" in China.