Development of highly permeable ultra-thin Pd-based supported membranes

This paper reports the preparation and characterization of ultra-thin (∼1 μm thick) Pd-based supported membranes for hydrogen purification. Ultra-thin membranes have been prepared by a combination of PVD magnetron sputtering and electroless plating techniques. The membranes have been characterized for single gas and mix gas permeation at temperatures between 350 and 500 °C and they have shown to exhibit very high hydrogen fluxes combined with a good perm-selectivity (H₂/N₂ ≈ 500). These results have been compared with the performance of highly permeable membranes reported in the literature. The influence of the morphology of the deposited Pd-based layers on the membrane performance has been investigated and discussed.