Investigation of Oil Adsorption Performance of Polypropylene Nanofiber Nonwoven Fabric

Nanofibers can be used in fields/applications such as medical care, environment protection, apparel, and agriculture. In addition, we believe that this field would continue to show substantial growth in the future. In this study, we focused on its application to oil adsorption. Oil adsorbing performances achieved polymeric nanofiber mass production by a melt-blowing method. We first tested the oil adsorption performance of fiber experimentally under different bulk densities and thicknesses. We also conducted the suction experiment with different bulk densities. Based on experimental result, we considered contact angle, capillarity, and surface tension to be the causes of oil adsorption. We also proposed a three-direction physical model for oil adsorption and used it to calculate the theoretical oil adsorption rate by different free volumes. As a result, we confirmed that the proposed three-direction model could accurately estimate the oil adsorption rate. Moreover, nanofiber has exceptional oil adsorption performance. Further, the fiber with average diameter of 1500 nm exceeds 60 times its self-weight. Therefore, we believe that the proposed nanofiber nonwoven fabric oil adsorption pad could adequately be used as oil adsorption material.