Solid, polymer membranes fabricated from room-temperature ionic liquid monomers containing oligo(ethylene glycol) or nitrile-terminated alkyl substituents tethered to imidazolium cations were found to exhibit ideal CO 2 /N 2 and CO 2 /CH 4 separation factors significantly greater than those with comparable length n -alkyl substituents, with similar CO 2 permeability. Polymers containing these functional groups exhibited CO 2 /N 2 gas separation performance exceeding the “upper bound” of a “Robeson Plot”.