membranes to separate CO2 from flue gas streams more effectively. Surface functionalization (and thus chemistry) can be tuned to be more efficient for wet flue gas streams as compared to dry flue gas streams. While previously, silica membranes were impractical due to their technical scalability and cost (they are very difficult to produce in an economical manner on a large scale), there have been demonstrations of a simple method of producing silica membranes on hollow polymeric supports. These demonstrations indicate that economical materials and methods can effectively separate CO2 and N2. Ordered mesoporous silica membranes have shown considerable potential for surface modification that allows for ease of CO2 separation. Surface functionalization with amines leads to the reversible formation of carbamates (during CO2 flow), increasing CO2 selectivity significantly. Zeolite membranes Zeolites are crystalline aluminosilicates with a regular repeating structure of molecular-sized pores. Zeolite membranes selectively separate molecules based on pore size and polarity and are thus highly tunable to specific gas separation processes. In general, smaller molecules and those with stronger zeolite-adsorption properties are adsorbed onto zeolite membranes with larger selectivity. The capacity to discriminate based on both molecular size and adsorption affinity makes zeolite membranes an attractive candidate for CO2 separation from N2, CH4, and H2. Scientists have found that the gas-phase enthalpy (heat) of adsorption on zeolites increases as follows: H2 < CH4 < N2 < CO2. It is generally accepted that CO2 has the largest adsorption energy because it has the largest quadrupole moment, thereby increasing its affinity for charged or polar zeolite pores. At low temperatures, zeolite adsorption-capacity is large and the high concentration of adsorbed CO2 molecules blocks the flow of other gases. Therefore, at lower temperatures, CO2 selectively permeates through zeolite pores. Several recent research efforts have focused on developing new zeolite membranes that maximize the CO2 selectivity by taking advantage of the low-temperature blocking phenomena. Researchers have synthesized Y-type (Si:Al>3) zeolite membranes which achieve room-temperature separation factors of 100 and 21 for CO2/N2 and CO2/CH4 mixtures respectively. DDR-type and SAPO-34 membranes have also shown promise in separating CO2 and CH4 at a variety of pressures and feed compositions. The SAPO-34 membranes, being Nitrogen selective, are also strong contender for natural gas sweetening process. Metal-organic framework (MOF) membranes There have been advances in zeolitic-imidazolate frameworks (ZIFs), a subclass of metal-organic frameworks (MOFs), that have allowed them to be useful for carbon dioxide separation from flue