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B) Impact of Naturally Occuring Crude Oil Compounds on CO, Separation from CH, Problem Statement The use of commercial membrane systems to achieve a variety of separations in the last decade continues to become more widespread thanks to their low maintenance costs, scalable size, and transportability. In particular, polymeric membranes provide a competitive alternative for gas separations to more traditional processes used such as pressure-swing adsorption, cryogenic distillation, and other packed-bed solid adsorbents such as zeolites and activated carbon!. One notable capability of such membranes is the separation of CO, from CH,’, which if optimized, could play a key role in the production of upgraded natural gas for the energy sector. This is because methane is rich in calorific energy and CO, does not have a heating value, meaning the amount of natural gas that would have to be fired by heaters to obtain the same energetic output would be reduced*. However, one obstacle to driving the methane purity of natural gas up is the presence of other pollutants in such gaseous feeds. In our laboratory, the gas separation equipment available to us includes an oxygen analyzer, two hollow-fiber polymeric membrane modules designed to produce nitrogen-rich air, a membrane air dryer that can be used to reduce the moisture content of the feed gas, and a third gas separation membrane module. Using a polyimide membrane in the third module, we can examine the impact of the presence of pollutants in a CH,/CO, gas stream. More specifically, we seek to study the effect of varying the concentration of common gases that appear as a byproduct of refining crude oil, given that the petrochemical industry is a key player in the energy sector and production and sale of natural gas. Some of these include “BTEX” (Benzene, Toluene, Ethylbenzene, Xylene), Hydrogen Sulfide (H,S), and paraffinic hydrocarbons in the C,-C;; range’. Given that I have spent 3 internship work terms in a refinery setting and the other three members of my group have several internship experiences of their own, I believe my team fills a niche that makes us highly valuable in conducting this experiment. This is because in addition to having perspective on the economic and process drivers for projects in industry, we still maintain knowledge on separations theory that many engineers with several years of experience in petrochemicals would likely lack. Objectives This experiment will be the study of pollutant presence versus separation efficiency of CH, from CO, using common components of crude oil. By varying the pollutant concentration in the feed gas stream at constant process conditions and measuring the retentate and permeate flows and pressures, we will be able to construct curves to show how the permeance of each species varies with pollutant concentration, and thus selectivity. This will allow us to understand 
