Ultra-pure water production by integrated electrodialysis-ion exchange/electrodeionization

Ultra-pure water (UPW), a highly treated water free of colloidal material and of a conductivity less than 0.06 ${\mu}S$, is an essential component required by modern industry. One of the methods for UPW production is the electrodialysis-ion exchange (ED/IE) system, in which the electrodialysis (ED) process is used as a preliminary demineralization step. The IE step can be replaced with electrodeionization (EDI) to decrease the volume of post-regeneration lyes. In this paper, the electrodialysis process carried out to relatively low diluate conductivity was investigated and the costs of UPW production were calculated. The optimal value of desalination degree by ED in the ED/IE and ED/EDI systems was estimated. UPW unit costs for integrated ED/IE and ED/EDI systems were compared to simple ion exchange and other methods for UPW production (RO-IE, RO-EDI). The minimal UPW unit costs in ED/EDI integrated system were estimated as $0.37/$m^3$ for feed TDS 600 mg/L and $0.36/$m^3$ for feed TDS 400 mg/L at 64 $m^3/h$ capacity, which was lower than in the comparable ED/IE integrated system ($0.42-0.44/$m^3$). The presented results suggest that an ED/EDI integrated system may be economically viable.