Nanofiltration membranes technology commonly used for wastewater treatment especially
wastewater containing charged and/or uncharged species. Commonly, textile wastewater
possesses high chemical oxygen demand (COD) and non-biodegradable compounds such as
pigments and dyes which lead to environmental hazard and serious health problem. Therefore, the
objective of this study was to investigate the effects of hydrophilic surfactant on the preparation and
performance of Active Nanofiltration (ANF) membrane. The polymeric ANF membranes were
prepared via dry/wet phase inversion technique by immersion precipitation process. The
Cetyletrimethylammonium bromide (CTAB) as cationic surfactant was added in casting solution at
concentrations from 0 to 2.5 wt%. The synthesized membrane performance was evaluated in terms
of pure water permeation (PWP) and dye rejection. The experimental data showed that the
membrane demonstrated good increment of PWP ranging from 0.27 to 10.28 L/m2
h at applied
pressure from 100 to 500kPa, respectively. Meanwhile, the ANF membranes achieved high
removal of Methyl Blue and Reactive Black 5 dye up to 99.5% and 91.6%, respectively.