High-efficiency electrospun PVDF@MXene composite membrane with covalent bonding and well-dispersed internal materials for solar-driven seawater desalination

Environmentally friendly and efficient solar-driven interfacial evaporation (SDIE) has been increasingly applied to seawater desalination, and the easy-to-operate electrospinning technology has attracted more and more attention. However, photothermal materials such as MXene are often combined with polymers suitable for spinning through ordinary blending. The inherent difficult dispersion of it may lead to the instability of spinning and decrease the performance of evaporators, further hindering their production and application. To address these challenges, this work designs a covalent bonding PVDF@MXene composite as the spinning raw material. Using the electrospinning technology, the high-efficiency membrane-based evaporator with well-dispersed internal materials and strong homogeneity is successfully fabricated. The membrane performance is optimal when the MXene content is 25 %, achieving an evaporation rate of 1.88 kg·m −2 ·h −1 and an efficiency of 94.06 % under one sun. Besides, it exhibits remarkable salt resistance, maintaining an evaporation rate of 1.81 kg·m −2 ·h −1 even at the salinity of up to 20 wt%. More importantly, the membrane can be immersed in oxidative reagents for 24 h without degradation or reduced performance, demonstrating its good environmental stability. Overall, this research not only provides a rational idea for addressing the dispersion issue of MXene, but also presents a potential solution to deal with the global freshwater shortage emergency.