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Abstract This study aims to investigate the performance of composite carbon nano-materials for sea water desalination. Some carbon nano-materials (carbon nano-tubes, graphene, graphene oxide and graphite) were incorporate into CA flat sheet membrane and characterized. According to the obtained results, we can conclude the following points: a. The optimum condition for CA membrane was CA: Acetone 25: 75 ratio with carbon nano-materials as additive polymer at immersion bath 20 oC for 1 h and annealing temperature 90 oC for 10 minutes. b. The optimum condition applied to CA membrane with carbon nano-materials (CNT, G, GO and graphite) with concentrations (0.01, 0.03 and 0.05) wt% to study its effect on membrane permeability and showed that 0.01 and 0.03 wt% of CNT were the best in addition to CA membrane. Also, G and GO with concentration 0.01 wt% and graphite with concentration 0.03 wt% were the compatible concentrations for application. • Application with synthetic water 35 g/L and sea water applied to determine membrane efficiency. The results reported porous membrane with no lateral or macro voids and thin dense layer. By adding CNT and increasing its concentration from 0.01 to 0.03 wt% recorded a decrease in elongation at break% from 7 to 2.5% comparing with CA which gave 4% elongation at break. Adding of 0.03 wt% graphite to CA membrane gives the same morphology of 0.01 CNT but elongation % increased to 5%. Also, 0.01 G and GO showed lateral voids and nearly the same mechanical behavior 5% elongation at break. All carbon nano-materials had no remarkable effect on membrane thermal stability. Although, both CA with 0.01 CNT and 0.03 wt% graphite gave the best salt rejection 98.6 and 96.4% for applied synthetic water with 45 and 20 L.m-2.h-1 pure water flux comparing with CA membrane which gave 79.2 % and 40 L.m-2.h-1 pure water flux. On the other hand 0.03 CNT, 0.01 G and 0.01 GO gave 97, 88 and 94% salt rejection at 35 g/L synthetic water application and 60, 70 and 30 L.m-2.h-1 pure water flux, respectively. • Application to real sea water is considered as a very important test to transfer to real applications. Alexandria was chosen for its Mediterranean sea. The salt rejection values were 94.1 and 94.2 % for CA membrane with 0.01 wt% CNT and 0.03 wt% graphite while pure water fluxes record 40 and 30 L.m-2.h-1, respectively. CA membrane without any additives showed 71.2% salt rejection with 38 L.m-2.h-1 pure water fluxes. On the other hand 0.03 CNT, 0.01 G and 0.01 GO gave 93, 85 and 91 % salt rejection with 60, 70 and 50 L.m-2.h-1 pure water flux. |