• Proceedings of the Membrane Society of Korea Conference
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• 2002.07a
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• pp.1-12
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• 2002

Desalination by reverse osmosis (RO), which first entered commercial use in the 1970s, was initially mainly used for treating brackish water. Technological progress led to the development of an RO membrane enabling single-pass seawater desalination. Toyobo succeeded in developing a single-pass seawater desalination RO module composed of hollow fiber type membranes made of cellulose triacetate in 1978, and then in 1979 began production of the first commercially available double-element module. This double-element module has many advantages suitable for seawater desalination. It has high chlorine tolerance and high salt rejection, derived from the properties of the membrane material, and it is highly resistant to fouling and scaling matters due to the unique flow pattern and fiber bundle configuration. These advantages help to explain why the Toyobo double-element module has been used so successfully at the many seawater desalination plants around the world. Since the 1980s, large plants capable of desalinating several tens of thousands of cubic meters a day have sprung up around the Mediterranean and In the Middle East. The Jeddah RO Phase I Plant, which has a capacity of 56, 800m$^3$/day, went into operation in 1989. In 1994, the same sized Phase II Plant came on stream, giving the plant a huge total capacity of 113, 600m$^3$/day. The plant constructor Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Ltd. (MHI), and the RO membrane manufacturer Toyobo Co., Ltd. In 1998, the world's largest RO seawater desalination plant in operation, which has a capacity of 128, 000m$^3$/day and is run by Saudi Arabia's Saline Water Conversion Corporation (SWCC), went into operation at Yanbu. RO seawater desalination technology has thus already reached the stage of full-scale commercial use. In order to encourage its wider use, however, RO desalination needs to be made more economical by lowering construction and water treatment costs. Toyobo has therefore developed a new economical RO desalination system by a recovery ratio of 60% using a high-pressure module with a high product flow rate. In 2000, Toyobo high recovery membrane module was selected for the largest seawater desalination plant in Japan, which has a capacity of 50, 000m$^3$/day.

• Membrane and Water Treatment
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• v.5 no.1
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• pp.15-29
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• 2014

Reverse Osmosis (RO) desalination has gained wide and increasing acceptance around the world as a straightforward undertaking to alleviate the alarming water crisis. An enhanced monitoring of the quality of the water feeding in seawater RO (SWRO) plant through the application of an effective pretreatment option is one of the keys to the success of RO technology in desalination plants. Over the past 10 years, advances in ultrafiltration (UF) membrane technologies in application for water and wastewater treatment have prompted an impetus for using membrane pretreatment in seawater desalination plants. By integrating SWRO plant with UF pretreatment, the rate of membrane fouling can be significantly reduced and thus extend the life of RO membrane. With the growing importance and significant advances attained in UF pretreatment, this review presents an overview of UF pretreatment in SWRO plants. The advantages offered by UF as an alternative of pretreatment option are compared to the existing conventionally used technologies. The current progress made in the integration of SWRO with UF pretreatment is also highlighted. Finally, the recent advances pursued in UF technology is reviewed in order to provide an insight and hence path the way for the future development of this technology.

• Journal of Korean Society of Water and Wastewater
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• v.23 no.2
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• pp.251-255
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• 2009

Foreign and domestic seawater desalination plant market investigation was performed to analyze the worldwide trend of seawater desalination plant market and to establish the activation plan for seawater desalination plant application. Water demand and seawater desalination related laws and regulations were investigated and analyzed for the activation plan. RO type and large scale plants are popular nowadays however there are only small plants in island region in Korea. There will be about $1 million\;m^3/day$ deficit in 2015 according to the water demand forecasting from Ministry of Environment and Ministry of Land, Transportation, and Maritime Affairs in Korea. Therefore, it is necessary to activate the domestic application of seawater desalination plant to secure stable water resources. To activate the domestic application of seawater desalination plant, first, we need to establish regulations, support system in the water service law for seawater desalination plant. Second, related Ministry should increase the support for the operation and management of seawater desalination plant and suggest the construction of seawater desalination plant for water resources security near seaside region.

• Journal of Korea Water Resources Association
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• v.44 no.10
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• pp.809-817
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• 2011

We analyzed various cost components for approximately 40 small-scale island desalination plants operated by K-water. A significant factor affecting desalination cost was found, and we proposed a way to reduce desalination costs. All plants considered were reverse osmosis (RO) facilities. TDS concentrations of feed water varied from less than 1,000 mg/L (practically considered freshwater) to over 30,000 mg/L (nearly seawater). Analysis of desalination costs from 2005 to 2009 indicated that maintenance, labor, and energy were the three biggest components that accounted for 50.6%, 36.9% and 7.8%, respectively. It was well known that TDS of feed water directly affected energy needed for RO process. In this study we found that maintenance cost was also directly related to feed water TDS. This finding indicated that lowering feed water TDS might result in significant desalination cost reduction.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Systems Engineering
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• v.12 no.1
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• pp.73-87
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• 2016

Combining power generation and water production by desalination is economically advantageous. Most desalination projects use fossil fuels as an energy source, and thus contribute to increased levels of greenhouse gases. Environmental concerns have spurred researchers to find new sources of energy for desalination plants. The coupling of nuclear power production with desalination is one of the best options to achieve growth with lower environmental impact. In this paper, we will per-form a sensitivity study of coupling nuclear power to various combinations of desalination technology: {1} thermal (MSF [Multi-Stage Flashing], MED [Multi-Effect Distillation], and MED-TVC [Multi-Effect Distillation with Thermal Vapour Compression]); {2} membrane RO [Reverse Osmosis]; and {3} hybrid (MSF-RO [Multi-Stage Flashing & Reverse Osmosis] and MED-RO [Multi-Effect Distillation & Reverse Osmosis]). The Korean designed reactor plant, the APR1400 will be modeled as the energy production facility. The economical evaluation will then be executed using the computer program DEEP (Desalination Economic Evaluation Program) as developed by the IAEA. The program has capabilities to model several types of nuclear and fossil power plants, nuclear and fossil heat sources, and thermal distillation and membrane desalination technologies. The output of DEEP includes levelized water and power costs, breakdowns of cost components, energy consumption, and net saleable power for any selected option. In this study, we will examine the APR1400 coupled with a desalination power plant in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) as a prototypical example. The KSA currently has approximately 20% of the installed worldwide capacity for seawater desalination. Utilities such as power and water are constructed and run by the government. Per state practice, economic evaluation for these utilities do not consider or apply interest or carrying cost. Therefore, in this paper the evaluation results will be based on two scenarios. The first one assumes the water utility is under direct government control and in this case the interest and discount rate will be set to zero. The second scenario will assume that the water utility is controlled by a private enterprise and in this case we will consider different values of interest and discount rates (4%, 8%, & 12%).

• Journal of Korean Society of Water and Wastewater
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• v.22 no.3
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• pp.337-342
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• 2008

A population growth and industry advances are increasing the demand for water while improving the quality of life. By turning seawater into freshwater it is an alternative for the water shortage problem. The study analyzes the orders and makes suggestions on the outlook of an enterprise that can supply desalination plants both inside and outside the country. It compares the production capacity of enterprises in the desalination industry who deal with the thermal and RO methods. We compare 7 enterprises in the thermal method which includes Doosan Heavy Industries, and the top 10 enterprises in the RO method which includes General Electric Corp. Now that the markets in the Middle East have opened and markets in other regions are gradually growing, demand for water will grow especially in developing countries that are in the process of industrialization. Also, the market share of thermal method desalination has been falling, gradually, because too much energy is spent during the process. On the other hand, the market share of the RO method will rise from 37% in 2005 to 57% in 2015. Recently, the desalination market shows that changing from thermal method to RO method is the trend in the Middle East. Growth and demand in other regions are growing at the same pace as the Middle East. Due to this trend, if the RO system, which is highly effective and uses less energy, were to be continuously developed it would be possible to supply water using sea water and would be a viable alternative water resource.

• Membrane and Water Treatment
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• v.9 no.2
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• pp.129-136
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• 2018

In this contribution, the control of multivariable reverse osmosis (RO) desalination plant using proportional-integral-derivative (PID) controllers is presented. First, feed-forward compensators are designed using simplified decoupling method and then the PID controllers are tuned for flux (flow-rate) and conductivity (salinity). The tuning of PID controllers is accomplished by minimization of the integral of squared error (ISE). The ISEs are minimized using a recently proposed algorithm named as teacher-learner-based-optimization (TLBO). TLBO algorithm is used due to being simple and being free from algorithm-specific parameters. A comparative analysis is carried out to prove the supremacy of TLBO algorithm over other state-of-art algorithms like particle swarm optimization (PSO), artificial bee colony (ABC) and differential evolution (DE). The simulation results and comparisons show that the purposed method performs better in terms of performance and can successfully be applied for tuning of PID controllers for RO desalination plants.

• Journal of Korean Society of Water and Wastewater
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• v.24 no.2
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• pp.157-164
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• 2010

Seawater desalination has vest interest in terms of ultimate water resources for the countries suffering lack of water supply. Water demand is steadily increasing due to the population growth and industrialization in Asia. The objectives of this study are to prospect the desalination market in Asia countries including China, India and Singapore, and to propose possible strategies of getting through Asia water market. Water supply in China is increasing up to $5,322,060m^3$/d in 2015. Northeast coastal areas such as Tianjin, Shandong, Hubei, and Liaoning are expected rapid increase for water demand. The investment of water supply in India would be 1.74 billion dollars during 2006 to 2015. Chennai, Kutch, and Pondicherry have possibility in introducing seawater desalination plants. Singapore is focusing on water reuse, and operating three NEWater plants (water reuse plants). BOT with total solution providing financing, construction, operation etc. is an adequate strategy to getting through China water market, while desalination plant project connecting with power plant is desirable in India. The cooperative system with Korea and Singapore creates synergy effect regarding planning and operating experience of Singapore and EPC ability of Korea.

• Journal of Korean Society of Water and Wastewater
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• v.23 no.6
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• pp.811-823
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• 2009

Seawater desalination process using a reverse osmosis (RO) membrane has been considered as one of the most promising technologies in solving the water scarcity problems in many arid regions around the world. To protect RO membrane in the process, a thorough understanding of the pretreatment process is particularly needed. Seawater organic matters (SWOMs) may form a gel layer on the membrane surface, which will increase a concentration polarization. As the SWOMs can be utilized as a substrate, membrane biofouling will be progressed on the RO membrane surface, resulting in the flux decline and increase of trans-membrane pressure drop and salt passage. In the middle of disinfection, an optimal chlorine dosage and neutralizer (sodium bisulfite, SBS) should be practiced to prevent oxidizing the surface of RO membranes. Additional fundamental research including novel non-susceptible biofouling membranes would be necessary to provide a guide line for the proper pretreatment process.

• Membrane and Water Treatment
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• v.13 no.1
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• pp.39-49
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• 2022

Seawater desalination is doubtlessly a viable option to supply fresh drinking water. Nevertheless, RO (reverse osmosis) desalination plants in specific areas may be intermittently operated to match the imbalance between water demand and supply. Although a handful of works have been done on other membrane systems, few studies have attempted to mitigate fouling in intermittent RO systems. Accordingly, the objectives of this paper were to examine the effect of the intermittent operation on RO fouling; and to compare four intermittent operation modes including feed solution recirculation, membrane storage in the feed solution, deionized water (DI) recirculation, and membrane storage in DI water. Results showed that intermittent operation reduced RO fouling under several conditions. However, the extents of fouling mitigation were different depending on the feed conditions, foulant types, and membrane lay-up methods. When the feed solution was recirculated during the lay-up, the restoration of the flux was less significant than that by the feed solution feed-up. The use of deionized water during the lay-up was effective to restore flux, especially when the feed solution contains scale-forming salts (CaSO₄) and/or colloidal silica.