• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.17 no.7
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• pp.54-62
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• 2016

The most efficient system for converting heat to electricity, AMTEC (Alkali Metal Thermal-to-Electric Convertor), is a device that directly converts heat energy to electricity using an alkali metal (sodium) as the working fluid. The AMTEC consists of a low pressure chamber, high pressure chamber, BASE (Beta-Alumina Solid Electrolyte), and artery wick. The main heat loss of the AMTEC system occurs in the low pressure chamber. A high power generation rate is thought to be obtainable by using a high temperature in the BASE. Therefore, to reduce the radiation heat loss, 6 types of radiation shields were examined to reduce the radiative heat loss in the low pressure chamber. The power generation rate of the AMTEC varied depending on the shape of the radiation shield. CFD (Computational Fluid Dynamics) analyses were carried out to optimize the shape of the radiation shield. As a result, the optimum radiation shield was found to consist of a curvature formed at the vertical point, in which case the dimensionless temperature (condenser temperature/BASE temperature) is approximately 0.665 and the maximum power generated is calculated to be 17.69W. Increasing the distance beween the BASE and condenser leads to an increase in the power generated, and the power generated with the longest distance was 17.58 W. The shields with multiple holes and multiple horizontal layers showed power reduction rates of 0.91 W and 2.06 W, respectively.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers B
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• v.36 no.9
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• pp.953-960
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• 2012

An AMTEC (alkali metal thermal electric converter) is a device that is used for the direct conversion of heat to electricity. Sodium is used as the working fluid, and its circulation is driven by a capillary wick. The wicks used for circulation include an evaporator wick, artery wick, and condenser wick, and each wick has a pressure drop because of the circulation of liquid and vapor. For the circulation of sodium, the capillary pressure of the evaporator wick must be greater than the total pressure drop in the wicks. In this study, the pressure drop in the evaporator wick, artery wick, and condenser wick and the heat loss from the evaporator to the condenser through the artery wick were analyzed for the design of a 100 W AMTEC prototype. It was found that a particle diameter of 10 ${\mu}m$ is suitable for the evaporator wick to maintain a capillary pressure greater than total pressure drop in the circulation loop.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.41 no.7
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• pp.665-671
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• 2017

The alkali-Metal Thermal-to-electric Converter (AMTEC) is one of the promising static energy conversion technologies for the direct conversion of thermal energy to electrical energy. The advantages over a conventional energy converter are its high theoretical conversion efficiency of 40% and power density of 500 W/kg. The working principle of an AMTEC battery is the electrochemical reaction of the sodium through an ion conducting electrolyte. Sodium ion pass through the hot side of the beta"-alumina solid electrolyte (BASE) primarily as a result of the pressure difference. This pressure difference across the BASE has a significant effect on the overall performance of the AMTEC system. In order to build the high pressure difference across the BASE, hermeticity is required for each joined components for high temperature range of $900^{\circ}C$. The AMTEC battery was manufactured by utilizing robust joining technology of BASE/insulator/metal flange interfaces of the system for both structural and electrical stability. The electrical potential difference between the anode and cathode sides, where the electrons emitted from sodium ionization and recombined into sodium, was characterized as the open-circuit voltage. The efforts of technological improvement were concentrated on a high-power output and conversion efficiency. This paper discusses about the joining and performance of the AMTEC systems.

• Carbon letters
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• v.24
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• pp.82-89
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• 2017

In this study, composite PAN-based ACNFs embedded with MgO and $MnO_2$ were prepared by the electrospinning method. The resultant pristine ACNFs, ACNF/MgO and $ACNF/MnO_2$ were characterized in terms of their morphological changes, SSA, crystallinity and functional group with FESEM-EDX, the BET method, XRD and FTIR analysis, respectively. Results from this study showed that the SSA of the ACNF/MgO composite ($1893m^2g^{-1}$) is significantly higher than that of the pristine ACNFs and $ACNF/MnO_2$ which is 478 and $430m^2g^{-1}$, respectively. FTIR analysis showed peaks of 476 and $547cm^{-1}$, indicating the presence of MgO and $MnO_2$, respectively. The FESEM micrographs analysis showed a smooth but coarser structure in all the ACNFs. Meanwhile, the ACNF/MgO has the smallest fiber diameter ($314.38{\pm}62.42nm$) compared to other ACNFs. The presence of MgO and $MnO_2$ inside the ACNFs was also confirmed with EDX analysis as well as XRD. The adsorption capacities of each ACNF toward $CH_4$ were tested with the volumetric adsorption method in which the ACNF/MgO exhibited the highest $CH_4$ adsorption up to $2.39mmol\;g^{-1}$. Meanwhile, all the ACNF samples followed the pseudo-second order kinetic model with a $R^2$ up to 0.9996.

• Membrane and Water Treatment
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• v.11 no.5
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• pp.323-331
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• 2020

With the increasing demand on reverse osmosis (RO) membranes for water purification worldwide, the number of disposed membrane elements is expected to increase accordingly. Thus, recycling and reuse of end-of-life RO membranes should be a global environmental action. In this work, we aim to reuse the spent RO membrane for nanofiltration (NF) and ultrafiltration (UF) process by subjecting the spent membrane to solvent and oxidizing solution treatment, respectively. Our results showed that solvent-treated RO membrane could perform as good as commercial NF membrane by achieving similar separation efficiencies, but with reduced water permeability due to membrane surface fouling. By degrading the polyamide layer of RO membrane, the transformed membrane could achieve high water permeability (85.6 L/㎡.h.bar) and excellent rejection against macromolecules (at least 87.4%), suggesting its reuse potential as UF membrane. More importantly, our findings showed that in-situ transformation on the spent RO membrane using solvent and oxidizing solution could be safely conducted as the properties of the entire spiral wound element did not show significant changes upon prolonged exposure of these two solutions. Our findings are important to open up new possibilities for the discarded RO membranes for reuse in NF and UF process, prolonging the lifespan of spent membranes and promoting the sustainability of the membrane process.

• 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.

• Membrane and Water Treatment
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• v.2 no.1
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• pp.25-37
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• 2011

PES UF membranes containing silver were prepared to impart antibacterial properties for waste water treatment. Asymmetric membranes for antibacterial application were prepared from polyethersulfone (PES) and silver nitrate ($AgNO_3$) (PES/$AgNO_3$=15/2 by weight) solution in N-Methyl-2-pyrrolidone (NMP) via simple wet phase inversion technique. These membranes were characterized by polyvinylpyrrolidone (PVP) and polyethylene glycol (PEG) of different molecular weights (1000 ppm in water) at room temperature and on operating pressure of 5 bars. It was observed that the water flux of PES-$AgNO_3$ membrane is slightly lower than virgin PES but still increased linearly with the increment of pressure applied. The morphology of the resulting membranes was examined using Field-Emission Scanning Electron Microscope (FESEM) coupled with Energy Dispersive Spectroscopy (EDS). Elemental analysis using EDS proved that silver is successfully loaded on the membrane surfaces. Due to the success of loading silver on membrane surfaces, antibacterial activities were evaluated via agar diffusion method against Escherichia coli (E.coli) and Staphylococcus aureus (S.aureus) culture. By incorporating 2 wt% of silver nitrate, PES-$AgNO_3$ showed significant inhibition ring on both E.coli and S.aureus. Filtration of E.coli solution (OD 0.31) showed satisfactory rejection data with ~100% inhibition growth after 24 hours incubation at $37^{\circ}C$. Resultant membranes also exhibit better tensile strength (compared to virgin PES) up to 71% may be due to the suggested interactions. The residual silver during fabrication was measured using ICP-MS and result showed that the residual silver content of PES-$AgNO_3$ membrane was only ~1% of the original silver added in the polymer solution. These studies have shown that PES-$AgNO_3$ UF membranes are potential in improving the filtration in water treatment.

• Membrane and Water Treatment
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• v.1 no.1
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• pp.49-60
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• 2010

In this study, response surface methodology (RSM) was performed in NF membrane process to evaluate the separation efficiency of membrane in the removal of salt and reactive dye by varying different variables such as pressure, temperature, pH, dye concentration and salt concentration. The significant level of both the main effects and the interaction were observed by analysis of variance (ANOVA) approach. Based on the statistical analysis, the results have provided valuable information on the relationship between these variables and the performances of membrane. The rejection of salt was found to be greatly influenced by pressure, pH and salt concentration whereas the dye rejection was relatively constant in between 96.22 and 99.43% regardless of the changes in the variables. The water flux on the other hand was found to be affected by the pressure and salt concentration. It is also found that the model predictions were in good agreement with the experimental data, indicating the validity of these models in predicting membrane performances prior to the real filtration process.

• Membrane and Water Treatment
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• v.8 no.3
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• pp.211-223
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• 2017

In this work, an attempt was made to compare the effects of UV irradiation on the intrinsic and separation properties of membranes made of two different polymeric materials, i.e., polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF) and polyetherimide (PEI). The changes on membrane structural morphologies and chemical characteristics upon UV-A exposure (up to 60 h) were studied by FESEM and FTIR, respectively. It was found that cracks and fractures were detected on the PVDF-based membrane surface when the membrane was exposed directly to UV light for up to 60 h. Furthermore, the mechanical strength and thermal stability of irradiated PVDF-based membrane was reported to decrease with increasing UV exposure time. The PEI membrane surface meanwhile remained almost intact throughout the entire UV irradiation process. Filtration experiments showed that the permeate flux of UV-irradiated PVDF membrane was significantly increased from approximately 11 to $16L/m^2.h$ with increasing UV exposure time from zero to 60 h. Oil rejection meanwhile was decreased from 98 to 85%. For the PEI-based membrane, oil rejection of >97% was recorded and its overall structural integrity was marginally affected throughout the entire UV irradiation process. The findings of this work showed that the PEI-based membrane should be considered as the host for photocatalyts incorporation if the membrane was to be used for UV-assisted wastewater treatment process.

• Membrane and Water Treatment
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• v.3 no.1
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• pp.25-34
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• 2012

Carboxylated polysulfone (CPS), poly (1,4-phenylene ether ethersulfone) (PPEES), membranes were prepared and used for the separation of NaCl and $CaCl_2$, in efficient way with less energy consumption. In this work, nanofiltration and reverse osmosis membranes were employed to the salt rejection behavior of the different salt solutions. The influence of applied pressure (1-12 bar), on the membrane performance was assessed. In CM series of membranes, $CM_1$ showed maximum of 97% water uptake and 36% water swelling, whereas, $CM_4$ showed 75% water uptake and 28% water swelling. In RCM series, $RCM_1$ showed 85% water uptake and 32% water swelling whereas, in $RCM_4$ it was 68% for water uptake and 20% for water swelling. Conclusively reverse osmosis membranes gave better rejection whereas nanofiltration membrane showed enhanced flux. CM1 showed 58% of rejection with 12 L/($m^2$ h) flux and $RCM_1$ showed 55% of rejection with 15 L/($m^2$ h) flux for 0.1 wt.% NaCl solution. Whereas, in 0.1 wt.% $CaCl_2$ solution, membrane $CM_1$ showed 78% of rejection with 12 L/($m^2$ h) flux and $RCM_1$ showed 63% rejection with flux of 9 L/($m^2$ h).