• Korean Chemical Engineering Research
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• v.43 no.2
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• pp.243-248
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• 2005

Membrane pervaporation processes could have advantages over distillation for separation of water/organics mixtures: a low energy demand and the ability to separate azeotropic mixtures or isomers. Zeolite membranes might show better thermal, mechanical and chemical stabilities than polymer membranes. Water could be effectively separated from water/organic mixtures using the NaA zeolite membrane because of its high hydrophilicity. In this study, water was separated by pervaporation using the NaA zeolite membrane from water/ethanol mixtures. As a mole fraction of ethanol increased, the total permeation flux and the water flux decreased while the separation factor increased, reached a maximum point, and decreased. As an experimental temperature increased, the total permeation flux increased while the separation factor increased at the lower mole fraction of ethanol than 0.8 and it decreased at the higher mole fraction of ethanol than 0.8. The total permeation flux and the separation factor could be maintained constant during the long term experiment longer than 160 hours. It was found that the NaA zeolite membrane synthesized in our study showed better performance on water/ethanol separation than that of a distillation process or PVA polymeric pervaporation membranes.

• Membrane and Water Treatment
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• v.11 no.2
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• pp.97-109
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• 2020

Membrane fouling is the main drawback of membrane technology. Frequent membrane cleaning and membrane replacement are, therefore, required to reduce membrane fouling that causes permeate flux reduction, lower rejection, or higher operating pressure. Studies have proved that the alteration of membrane properties is the key controlling factor in lessening membrane fouling. Among stimuli-responsive membranes, thermo-responsive membrane is the most popular, with a drastic phase transition and swelling-shrinking behavior caused by the temperature change. In this study, the thermo-responsive ability of two commercial membranes, PolyCera® Titan membrane and PolyCera® Hydro membrane, at different temperatures was studied on the antifouling function of the membrane in palm oil mill effluent (POME) treatment. The evaluation of the membrane's thermo-responsive ability was done through three cycles of adsorption (fouling) and desorption (defouling) processes in a membrane filtration process. The experimental result depicted that PolyCera® Hydro membrane had a higher membrane permeability of 67.869 L/㎡.h.bar than PolyCera® Titan membrane at 46.011 L/㎡.h.bar. However, the high membrane permeability of PolyCera® Hydro membrane was compensated with low removal efficiency. PolyCera® Titan membrane with a smaller mean pore size had better rejection performance than PolyCera® Hydro membrane for all tested parameters. On the other hand, PolyCera® Titan membrane had a better hydrodynamic cleaning efficiency than PolyCera® Hydro membrane regardless of the hydrodynamic cleaning temperature. The best hydrodynamic cleaning performed by PolyCera® Titan membrane was at 35℃ with the flux recovery ratio (FRR) of 99.17 ± 1.43%. The excellent thermo-responsive properties of the PolyCera® Titan membrane could eventually reduce the frequency of membrane replacement and lessen the use of chemicals for membrane cleaning. This outstanding exploration helps to provide a solution to the chemical industry and membrane technology bottleneck, which is the membrane fouling, thus reducing the operating cost incurred by the membrane fouling.

• Journal of Korean Society of Water and Wastewater
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• v.29 no.1
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• pp.133-138
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• 2015

Pressure retarded osmosis (PRO) process is one of membrane processes for harvesting renewable energy by using salinity difference between feed and draw solutions. Power is generated by permeation flux multiplied by hydraulic pressure in draw side. Membrane fouling phenomena in PRO process is presumed to be less sever, but it is inevitable. Membrane fouling in PRO process decreases water permeation through membrane, resulting in significant power production decline. This study intended to investigate the effect of hydraulic pressure in PRO process on alginate induced organic fouling as high and low hydraulic pressures (6.5 bar and 12 bar) were applied for 24 h under the same initial water flux. In addition, organic fouling in draw side from the presence of foulant (sodium alginate) in draw solution was examined. As major results, hydraulic pressure was found to be not a significant factor affecting in PRO organic fouling as long as the same initial water flux is maintained, inidicating that operating PRO process with high hydraulic pressure for efficient energy harvesting will not cause severe organic fouling. In addition, flux decline was negligible from the presence of organic foulant in draw side.

• Membrane Journal
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• v.18 no.1
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• pp.35-43
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• 2008

In this study, we tried to solve membrane fouling with membranes made by fine nano-particle in MBR process. And we confirmed good fouling resistance in pilot test. In this test, we confirmed our membrane with titania out-standing quality by testing in the pilot long-term test by comparing to other company product. Our membrane keep up steadily $20{\sim}25 L/m^2{\cdot}hr$ high flux in $7,000{\sim}13,000mg/L$ MLSS high sludge concentration. In addition to this quality, we studied membrane flux character related membrane arrangement, membrane-air line arrangement, air-line hole size, cleaning solution concentration, treatment method, etc. Using the optimization of this additional parameter, we tried to search method of maximizing membrane quality.

• Membrane and Water Treatment
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• v.9 no.5
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• pp.335-342
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• 2018

Micelle-Enhanced Ultrafiltration (MEUF) is a membrane separation processes that improving ultrafiltration process with the formation of micelles of the surface active agents. Surface active agents are widely used to improve membrane processes due to the ability to trap organic compounds and metals in the treatment of industrial waste water. In this study, surface active agents are used to improve micelle-enhanced ultrafiltration (MEUF) to reduce chemical oxygen demand (COD), total dissolved solid (TDS), turbidity and clogging the membrane in dairy wastewater treatment. Three important operational factors (anionic surface active agent concentration, pressure and pH) and these interactions were investigated by using response surface methodology (RSM) and Box-Behnken design. Results show that due to the concentration polarization layer and increase the number of Micelles; the anionic surface active agent concentration has a negative effect on the flux and has a positive effect on the elimination of contamination indices. pH, and the pressure have the greatest effect on flux. On the other hand, it could be stated that these percentages of separation are in the percentages range of Nano-filtration (NF). While MEUF process has higher flux than NF process. The results have been achieved at lower pressure while NF process needs high pressure, thus making MEUF is the replacement for the NF process.

• Membrane Journal
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• v.14 no.2
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• pp.157-165
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• 2004

PU/PDMS(Poly urethane/poly(dimethylsiloxane ) membranes were prepared to enhance chemical resistance over VOCs from 4,4'-diphenylmethane diisocyanate (MDI), poly(dimethylsiloxane) (PDHS). Swelling characteristics and vapor permeation performance of toluene, 1,2-dichloroethane, hexane through PU/PDMS membrane with various feed VOCs concentration were investigated. Swelling ratio of VOCs showed tendency of Toluene > 1,2-dichloroethane > hexane. Fiux of toluene and 1,2-dichloroethane increased with increasing fled concentration while the flux of hexane maintained with increasing feed. VOCs concentration in permeate maintained 50 wt% oi concentration due to high affinity of PU/PDHS membranes to VOCs.

• Membrane Journal
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• v.7 no.3
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• pp.150-156
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• 1997

The particle back transport velocity from the membrane surface were evaluated to determine the critical flux. Four kinds of back transport mechanisms were considered, i.e. back diffusion, shear induced migration, lateral migration, and interaction enhanced migration. The interaction enhanced migration caused by electrostatic repulsion between particles and membrane surface was found to be the most important mechanism of particle back transport for the charged particles of 0.1 ~10${\mu}{\textrm}{m}$ diameter with 20 to 40 mV of zeta potential. Hematite particles with different sizes were synthesized with ferric chloride (FeCl$_3$) and hydrochloric acid (HCl) at high temperature, and subsequently experimental critical fluxes for each sized particle were obtained. The experimental results were well coincident with the calculated critical fluxes based on back transport mechanisms.

• Membrane Journal
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• v.24 no.3
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• pp.194-200
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• 2014

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the performance of newly developed Large Pore Micro-Filtration (LPMF) membrane in Lab size for the application of water treatment, and to find its problems with solutions. The out-to-inside filtration hollow fiber LPMF membrane of which average pore size was $5{\mu}m$ was used at this study and its material was the PET braid reinforced PVDF. Filtration tests were done through gravity with 30 cm water head difference or pressure below 1.5 bar, and the backwash was done instantaneously with the filtrate after pressurizing it to about 4 bar. The water flux of the LPMF membrane with 0.2 bar TMP (Trans Membrane Pressure) was 2 times higher than $0.4{\mu}m$ MF membrane with $0.05{\mu}m$ UF filtrate of the tap water and it was measured also with 20~30 cm water head difference which showed over 800 LMH at 30 cm water head difference. And Time-To-Filter (TTF) was performed by using $5{\mu}m$ filter paper to optimize coagulants and dosage which enhanced filtrate's turbidity and stabilized filtration flux. When the LPMF was operated with 30 cm gravity with very high dose of inorganic coagulants, the flux was maintained over 80 LMH with 93.5~99.5% turbidity removal. Especially, the filtration was maintained stably in the flux and about 97% of the recovery rate by instantaneous pressurized backwash with about 4 bar of the filtrate when the packing density was about 19%. But there was instability in filtration, since the TMP was continuously going up by inefficient backwash when the packing density was 43%.

• Membrane and Water Treatment
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• v.12 no.1
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• pp.43-49
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• 2021

The Commercial polymeric membranes like Polysulfone (PSF), Polyvinylidene difluoride (PVDF) and Polyacrylonitrile (PAN) which are an integral part of water purification investigation were chosen for the shockwave (SW) exposure experiment. These membranes were prepared by blending polymer (wt. %) / DMF (solvent) followed by phase-inversion casting technique. Shockwaves are generated by using Reddy Tube lab module (Table-top Shocktube) with range of pressure (1.5, 2.5 and 5 bar). Understanding the changes in membrane before and after shock wave treatment by parameters, i.e., pure water flux (PWF), rejection (%), porosity, surface roughness (AFM), morphology (SEM) and contact angle which can significantly affect the membrane's performance. Flux values PSf membranes shows increase, 465 (pristine) to 524 (1.5wt%) LMH at 50 Psi pressure and similar enhancement was observed at 100Psi (625 to 696 LMH). Porosity also shows improvement from 73.6% to 76.84% for 15wt% PSf membranes. It was observed that membranes made of polymers such as PAN and PSF (of high w/w %) exhibits some resistance against shockwaves impact and are stable compared to other membranes. Shockwave pressure of up to 1.5 bar was sufficient enough to change properties which are crucial for performance. Membranes exposed to a maximum pressure of 5 bar completely scratched the surface and with minimum pressure of 1.5bar is optimum enough to improve the water flux and other parameters. Initial results proved that SW may be suitable alternative route to minimize/control membrane fouling and improve efficiency.

• Journal of environmental and Sanitary engineering
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• v.12 no.3
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• pp.81-86
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• 1997

In case of Industrial Wastewater, It was various pollutions, high concentration and different physical, chemical properties each other in accordance with classification of wastewater. Therefore, after inquiring into the influence on the membrane of the dissolved pollutants, we should select the membrane of best efficient quality. As results of experiments on pilot plant test, optimum operating pressure for fouling removal was 34BAR, when continues operating was 34 BAR, recovery rate was 75% and permeate water flux was $32.9{\;}{\ell}/hr{\cdot}m^{2}$.