Membrane and Water Treatment

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Comparative study of air gap, direct contact and sweeping gas membrane distillation configurations

  • Loussif, Nizar (Ecole Nationale d'Ingenieur de Monastir, Universite de Monastir) ;
  • Orfi, Jamel (Department of Mechanical Engineering, College of Engineering, King Saud University)
  • Received : 2015.09.01
  • Accepted : 2015.12.18
  • Published : 2016.01.25
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Abstract

The present study deals with a numerical simulation for the transport phenomena in three configurations of Membrane Distillation (Air Gap, Direct Contact and Sweeping Gas Membrane Distillation) usually used for desalination in order to make an objective comparison between them under the same operating conditions. The models are based on the conservation equations for the mass, momentum, energy and species within the feed saline and cooling solutions as well as on the mass and energy balances on the membrane sides. The theoretical model was validated with available data and was found in good agreement. DCMD configuration provided the highest pure water production while SGMD shows the highest thermal efficiency. Process parameters' impact on each configuration are also presented and discussed.

Keywords

Acknowledgement

Supported by : King Saud University

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