• Journal of Korean Society of Water and Wastewater
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• v.25 no.3
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• pp.335-342
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• 2011

Secondary effluent contains particle compounds which are comprised of microorganisms that occurs membrane fouling when the water is reused. This study evaluates the characteristics of membrane fouling of secondary effluent reuse. Effects of chemical backwashing are analyzed to reduce membrane fouling by regular chemical backwashing. As the result, major membrane foulants are verified EPS materials which include protein and polysaccharide that cause biofilm cake layer on the membrane. Also, sodium hypochlorite is applied to chemical backwashing. The backwashing improves recover rate when injected chemical concentration is increased and chemical backwashing cycle is amplified. Chemical backwashing cycle affects more than injected chemical concentration yet idle time does not noticeably influence on reducing membrane fouling.

• Journal of Korean Society of Water and Wastewater
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• v.25 no.6
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• pp.981-987
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• 2011

Biologically treated water contains a large quantity of organic matters and microorganisms which can cause various problems to membrane. The membrane fouling occurred by these reasons is hard to control by single physical cleaning. This study analyzes the efficiency of aeration with chemical backwashing and foulants removal during chemical backwashing. The cleaning efficiency improves when the chemical concentration is high and the contact time of chemical is long. Chemical backwashing with aeration shows exceptional cleaning efficiency which leads the physical cleaning is required during chemical backwashing since it forms flow inside the membrane submerged tank. From the foulants removal analysis, the particles such as turbidity and TOC removal rate increase when the aeration is applied. Dissolved matter of DOC and UV254 removal is dependent on higher chemical concentration. According to FTIR analysis, one of major foulants, the polysaccharide is controlled by the chemical backwashing with aeration condition.

• Membrane Journal
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• v.29 no.4
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• pp.216-222
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• 2019

In this study, permeation experiments were conducted using naturally circulating spherical beads, backwashable plate membrane and the air supplied from the bottom of the MBR. The activated sludge solution was maintained at 8,000 mg/L of MLSS and compared transmembrane pressure (TMP) with respect to FR (filtration and relaxation), FR/BW (filtration and relaxation/backwashing), SFCO (sinusoidal filtration continuous operation) and SFCO/BW (sinusoidal filtration continuous operation/backwashing). As the backwashing flux decreased from 47 to $14L/m^2{\cdot}hr$, the TMP increased generally, but the TMP of FR system increased significantly comparing with SFCO. In addition, the backwashing method reduced more TMP comparing to the cleaning method using spherical beads, and it was confirmed that the operation method using the spherical beads and the backwashing simultaneously is more effective than each method.

• Membrane and Water Treatment
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• v.8 no.3
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• pp.279-292
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• 2017

This study was aimed at ultrafiltration (UF) as a pretreatment before reverse osmosis (RO) within the scheme of hybrid reverse osmosis-multistage flush (RO-MSF) desalination. Seawater at elevated temperature (after MSF heat-exchangers) was used as a feed in this process. The pretreatment system was represented as a set of functionally-linked technological segments such as: UF filtration, backwashing, chemical- enhanced backwashing, cleaning, waste disposal, etc. The process represents the sequences of operating cycles. The cycle, in turn, consists of the following unit operations: filtration, backwashing and chemical-enhanced backwashing (CEB). Quantitative assessment was based on the following indicators: normalized permeability, transmembrane pressure, specific energy and water consumption, specific waste generation. UF pre-treatment is accompanied by the following waste streams: $W1=1.19{\times}10$ power of $-2m^3$ (disposed NaOCl with 0.0044% wt.)/$m^3$ (filtrate); $W2=5.95{\times}10$ power of $-3m^3$ (disposed $H_2SO_4$ with 0.052% wt.)/$m^3$(filtrate); $W3=7.26{\times}10$ power of $-2m^3$ (disposed sea water)/$m^3$ (filtrate). Specific energy consumption is $1.11{\times}10$ power of $-1kWh/m^3$ (filtrate). The indicators evaluated over the cycles with conventional (non-chemical) backwashing were compared with the cycles accompanied by CEB. A positive impact of CEB on performance indicators was demonstrated namely: normalized UF resistance remains unchanged within the regime accompanied by CEB, whereas the lack of CEB results in 30% of its growth. Those quantitative indicators can be incorporated into the target function for solving different optimization problems. They can be used in the software for optimisation of operating regimes or in the synthesis of optimal flow- diagram. The cycle characteristics, process parameters and water quality data are attached.

• Journal of Korean Society on Water Environment
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• v.37 no.6
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• pp.433-441
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• 2021

The aim of this study was to optimize the ozonation and ceramic membrane integrated process for greywater reclamation. The integrated process is a repeated sequential process of filtration and backwash with the same ceramic membrane. Also, this study used ozone and oxygen gas for the backwashing process to compare backwashing efficiency. The study results revealed that the optimum filtration and backwash time for the process was 10 minutes each when comparing the filtrate flow and membrane recovery rate. The integrated process was operated at three different operating conditions with i) 10 minutes for filtration and 10 minutes for ozonation, ii) 10 minutes for filtration and 10 minute for oxygen aeration, and iii) continuous filtration without any aeration for synthetic greywater. The integrated process with ozone backwashing could produce 0.55 L/min of filtrate with an average of 18.42% permeability recovery, while the oxygen backwashing produced 0.47 L/min and 6.26%, respectively. And without any backwashing, the integrated process could produce 0.29 L/min. This shows that the ozone backwash process is capable of periodically recovering from membrane fouling. The resistance of the fouled membrane was approximately 34.4% for the process with ozone backwashing, whereas the resistance was restored by 10.8% for the process with oxygen backwashing. Despite the periodical ozone backwashing and chemical cleaning, irreversible fouling gradually increased approximately 3 to 4%. Approximately 97.6% and 15% turbidity and TOC were removed by ceramic membrane filtration, respectively. Therefore, the integrated process with ozonation and ceramic membrane filtration is a potential greywater treatment process.

• Membrane Journal
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• v.30 no.2
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• pp.138-148
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• 2020

The purpose of this study was to identify the cleaning efficiency of fouled multi-bore hollow fiber membranes after purification of contaminated water. The PSf (polysulfone) based hollow fiber membrane manufactured by Pure & B Tech Co., Ltd. Was used in this study. The antifouling characteristics during the water treatment were studied using bovine serum albumin (BSA) as a model compound and the chemical resistance was evaluated after long-term impregnation in sodium hypochlorite (NaOCl) solution and Citric acid to understand the long term stability of the membranes. Water permeability and mechanical strength of the membranes after prolonged chemical exposure was measured to observe the change in mechanical stability and long term performance of the membrane. moreover, the recovery efficiency was also evaluated after chemical enhanced backwashing of a membrane contaminated with bovine serum albumin. The PSf hollow fiber membrane exhibited excellent chemical resistance, and it was confirmed that the efficiency of sodium hypochlorite was high as a result of chemical enhanced backwashing.

• Journal of Korean Society of Water and Wastewater
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• v.31 no.5
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• pp.389-395
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• 2017

In this paper, we investigate the characteristics of membrane fouling caused by water temperature in the Membrane bioreactor(MBR) process and try to derive the membrane fouling control by chemical enhanced backwashing(CEB). The extracellular polymeric substances(EPS) concentration was analyzed according to the water temperature in the MBR, and the membrane fouling characteristics were investigated according to the conditions, with sludge & without sludge, through a lab-scale reactor. As shown in the existing literature the fouling resistance rate was increased within sludge with the water temperature was lowered. However, in the lab-scale test using the synthetic wastewater, the fouling resistance increased with the water temperature. This is because that the protein of the EPS was more easily adsorbed on the membrane surface due to the increase of entropy due to the structural rearrangement of the protein inside the protein as the water temperature increases. In order to control membrane fouling, we tried to derive the cleaning characteristics of CEB by using sodium hypochlorite(NaOCl). We selected the condition with the chemicals and the retention time, and the higher the water temperature and the chemical concentration are the higher the efficiencies. It is considered that the increasing temperature accelerated the chemical reaction such as protein peptide binding and hydrolysis, so that the attached proteinaceous structure was dissolved and the frequency of the reaction collision with the protein with the chemical agent becomes higher. These results suggest that the MBRs operation focus on the fouling control of cake layer on membrane surface in low temperatures. On the other hand, the higher the water temperature is the more the operation strategies of fouling control by soluble EPS adsorption are needed.

• Membrane Journal
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• v.24 no.5
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• pp.393-399
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• 2014

The permeation experiments were carried out to examine the separation characteristics of the modules which were piled up the disc-ring shape patterned membranes in this study. First of all, permeability of the pure water was measured for the self-made 5 shape disc filters, and varied from 0.25 to $2.24L/m^2{\cdot}hr{\cdot}bar$. The module showed the maximum pure water permeability was the maximum permeation flux, and the module showed the minimum pure water permeability was the minimum permeation flux for 0.1 wt% kaolin solution. However, all of the modules were not proportioned to the pure water permeability. Also, the backwashing was performed periodically for the module 1 in order to operate with 0.1 wt% kaolin solution for a long time. The most efficient operating condition was the 8 minute permeation and 2 minute backwashing cycle.

• Membrane and Water Treatment
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• v.6 no.1
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• pp.77-94
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• 2015

Ultrafiltration membranes have several advantages over conventional drinking-water treatment. However, this technology presents major limitations, such as irreversible fouling and low removal of natural organic matter. Fouling depends heavily on the raw-water quality as well as on the operating conditions of the process, including flux, permeate recovery, pre-treatment, chemical cleaning, and backwashing. Starting with the premise that the optimisation of operating variables can improve membrane performance, different experiments were conducted in a pilot plant located in Granada (Spain). Several combinations of permeate and backwashing flow rates, backwashing frequencies, and aeration flow rates were tested for low-quality water coming from Genil River with the following results: the effluent quality did not depend on the combination of operating conditions chosen; and the membrane was effective for the removal of microorganisms, turbidity and suspended solids but the yields for the removal of dissolved organic carbon were extremely low. In addition, the threshold transmembrane pressure (-0.7 bar) was reached within a few hours and it was difficult to recover due to the low efficiency of the chemical cleanings. Moreover, greater transmembrane pressure due to fouling also increased the energy consumption, and it was not possible to lower it without compromising the permeate recovery. Finally, the intensification of aeration contributed positively to lengthening the operation times but again raised energy consumption. In light of these findings, the feasibility of ultrafiltration as a single treatment is questioned for low-quality influents.

• Membrane Journal
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• v.25 no.6
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• pp.524-529
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• 2015

In this study transmembrane pressure (TMP) was measured with respect to operational time by applying the sinusoidal flux continuous operation (SFCO) for the hollow fiber membrane. The hollow fiber module which has $100cm^2$ of effective area and $0.45{\mu}m$ nominal pore size was submerged in the activated sludge solution of MLSS 5,000 mg/L. The critical permeate flux was measured as $26.6L/m^2{\cdot}hr$ by the method of continuous flux step change. TMPs of the filtration/relaxation (FR), FR with backwashing (FR/BW) and SFCO modes were measured. The SFCO mode was more effective than FR and FR/BW modes below the critical permeate flux such as 15, 20 and $25L/m^2{\cdot}hr$. However, the FR/BW was confirmed as more effectively fouling controlled mode than SFCO mode above the critical permeate flux.