• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.47 no.7
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• pp.859-866
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• 2015

The aim of this work is to investigate the transport mechanism of radioactive nuclides through the reverse osmosis (RO) membrane and to estimate its effectiveness for nuclide separation from radioactive liquid waste. An analytical model is developed to simulate the RO separation, and a series of experiments are set up to confirm its estimated separation behavior. The model is based on the extended Nernst-Plank equation, which handles the convective flux, diffusive flux, and electromigration flux under electroneutrality and zero electric current conditions. The distribution coefficient which arises due to ion interactions with the membrane material and the electric potential jump at the membrane interface are included as boundary conditions in solving the equation. A high Peclet approximation is adopted to simplify the calculation, but the effect of concentration polarization is included for a more accurate prediction of separation. Cobalt and cesium are specifically selected for the experiments in order to check the separation mechanism from liquid waste composed of various radioactive nuclides and nonradioactive substances, and the results are compared with the estimated cobalt and cesium rejections of the RO membrane using the model. Experimental and calculated results are shown to be in excellent agreement. The proposed model will be very useful for the prediction of separation behavior of various radioactive nuclides by the RO membrane.

• Proceedings of the Membrane Society of Korea Conference
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• 1995.06a
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• pp.39-50
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• 1995

The membrane processes that are commonly uscd in water and wastewater treatment are reverse osmosis (Ro), ultrafiltration (UF) and microfiltration (MF), which utilize pressure differentials. There is also nano-filtration (NF), or low-pressure reverse osmosis, which is positioned midway between conventional reverse osmosis and ultrafiltration. Reverse osmosis membranes reject dissolved ions, while ultrafiltration can be used to reject relatively larger molecules, such as protein, polysacchalides and so on. Microfiltration is capable of eliminating particles at submicron level. This paper summarizes the characteristics of MSAS process first, as it is the main membrane process applied to wastewater treatment. Two successful examples of the applications, the cases of individual building reuse system and nightsoil treatment, are then shown. The latest trend of new membrane applications, i.e., immersed-type MSAS is also introduced.

• Journal of Korean Society of Water and Wastewater
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• v.24 no.1
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• pp.93-101
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• 2010

Reverse osmosis (RO) membranes have been widely used for desalination as well as water and wastewater treatment facilities. Cleaning process is important to maintain stable operation as well as prevention of membrane fouling. Purpose of this research is to analyze electrostatistic and chemical characteristics after cleaning of RO membrane against $SiO_2$ scale. Four RO membranes of polyamide are used and examined about effect of chemical cleaning. EDTA (ethylene diamine tetraacetic acid) and SDS (sodium dodecil sulfate) and NaOH are applied for cleaning process after operation in synthetic water. Then, cleaning was performed with chemicals such concentration as 6hr, 12hr and 24hr, respectively. As a result, transmittances of FT-IR of four membranes are compared at each cleaning concentration. Ta/Tv shows difference of chemical composition between new membrane and cleaning membrane after cleaning. Type B of RO membrane is turned out to be most vulnerable to cleaning among four membranes. In terms of zeta potential, new membrane has -16 mV to +6 mV on pH while scaled membrane has -18 mV to 2 mV. However, it changed -23mV to 0.9 mV after cleaning. In comparison with existing salt rejection of RO membranes after cleaning, the rejection of the membranes goes down 0.7% maximum. Though cleaning changes the characteristics of membrane surface, it does not greatly affect salt rejection. pH is a critical factor to flux change in PA (polyamide) membrane.

• Membrane and Water Treatment
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• v.1 no.4
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• pp.273-282
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• 2010

Treatment and reuse of industrial wastewater is becoming a major goal due to water scarcity. This may be carried out using membrane separation technology in general and reverse osmosis (RO) in particular. In the current study, polyamide (FT-30) membrane was employed for treatment of wastewater obtained from Faraman industrial zone based in Kermanshah (Iran). The effects of operating conditions such as transmembrane pressure, cross flow velocity, temperature and time on water flux and rejection of impurities including COD by the membrane were elucidated. The aim was an improvement in membrane performance. The results indicate that most of the chemical substances are removed from the wastewater. In particular COD removal was increased from 64 to around 100% as temperature increased from 15 to $45^{\circ}C$. The complete COD removal was obtained at transmembrane pressure of 20 bars and cross flow velocity of 1.5 m/s. The treated wastewater may be reused for various applications including makeup water for cooling towers.

• Journal of Korean Society on Water Environment
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• v.18 no.2
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• pp.159-168
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• 2002

A lab-scale Reverse Osmosis(RO) membrane reactor was installed to investigate the membrane permeability, characteristics of membrane fouling at each conditions, and performance of elimination at different trans-membrane pressure(TMP) in the liquid fertilizer accumulated system. Experimental setup was divided to three different TMP conditions. As a result of experiment, permeability of RO membrane was proportional to the increase of TMP and temperature. After experiment was completed, two types chemical cleaning(remove the organic foulant and inorganic foulant) was done, and recover rate of permeability was each 99.8, 99.7 and 99.7%, respectively. From this experimental data, membrane fouling could be determined that the most of it was recoverable in this system, and major reason of fouling was concentration polarization. Elimination rate of solute substance in the liquid fertilizer indicated very stable(above 99%), except ammonia nitrogen, and the most stable elimination rate was investigated at the highest TMP condition (Run 3).

• Journal of Korean Society of Water and Wastewater
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• v.24 no.6
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• pp.735-741
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• 2010

A pilot test was carried out to investigate the long term operation characteristics of Microfiltration (MF) system as a pretreatment for seawater reverse osmosis (SWRO) processes for two years. A commercialized MF module with pressurized operation type was used to filter seawater to remove particles which can foul reverse osmosis (RO) membrane. Silt Density Index (SDI) values of filtered seawater by the MF system were ranged from 0.14 to 1.79, which meet the SDI standard for RO feed water as depicted in previous literatures. Although the tested seawater is quite clean (i.e., dissolved organic cabon (DOC) concentration and turbidity were about 1 mg/l and less than 1 NTU, respectively) enough not to foul the MF membrane, steep increase in trans-membrane pressure (TMP) with a constant flux were observed over a whole operation period. A set of operation and water analysis data implies that the steep increase in TMP was resulted from iron and maganese fouling by the combination of metal corrosion by seawater and oxidation state by aeration and residual chlorine.

• Journal of Korean Society of Water and Wastewater
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• v.28 no.5
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• pp.549-554
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• 2014

This study was evaluated the applicability of the membrane filtration process (Micro Filtration (MF), nanofiltration membranes (NF), reverse osmosis (RO)) on the major radioactive substances, iodine ($I^-$) and cesium ($Cs^+$) using membranes produced in Korea and domestic raw water. Iodine ($I^-$) or cesium ($Cs^+$) in the microfiltration membrane (MF) process could not be expected removal efficiency by eliminating marginally at the combined state with colloidal and turbidity material. At the domestic raw water (lake water, turbidity 1.2 NTU, DOC 1.3 mg/L) conditions, nanofiltration membrane (NF) and reverse osmosis (RO) showed a high removal rate of about 88 ~ 99% for iodine ($I^-$) and cesium ($Cs^+$) and likely to be an alternative process for the removal of radioactive material.

• Journal of Korean Society on Water Environment
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• v.33 no.4
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• pp.403-408
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• 2017

In these days, wastewater reclamation and seawater desalination play essential role in addressing the challenge of worldwide water scarcity. Particularly, reverse osmosis (RO) for seawater desalination process is commonly used due to less energy consumption than conventional thermodynamic systems. However, membrane fouling and electrical energy consumption during operation of RO system for seawater desalination haver continued to be a obstruction to its application. In this study, therefore, wastewater secondary effluent is used for osmotic dilution of seawater. Firstly, fouling behaviour of RO by simulating wastewater effluent in osmotic dilution process was measured and we calculated energy consumption of overall desalination process by theoretical equations and commercial program. Our results reveal that RO membrane fouling can be efficiently controlled by pre-treatment systems such as nano filtration (NF) or forward osmosis (FO) process. Especially FO system for osmotic dilution process is a non-pressurized membrane system and, therefore, the operating energy consumption of overall desalination system was the lowest. Moreover, fouling layer on FO membrane is comparatively weak and reversible enough to be disrupted by physical cleaning. Thus, RO system with low salinity feed water through FO process is possible as a less energy consuming desalination system with efficient membrane fouling control.

• Journal of Korean Society of Water and Wastewater
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• v.27 no.6
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• pp.779-785
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• 2013

This study investigated the applicability of a two step microfiltration(MF) and reverse osmosis(RO) membrane system for reuse of tunnel wastewater. In this two step process, the MF system first treated only micropollutants in tunnel wastewater such as suspended solids(SS) and heavy metals, achieving less than 0.2 NTU turbidity, less than 1.1 mg/L chemical oxygen demand($COD_{Mn}$) and less than 0.8 mg/L total manganese(Mn). The RO system then removed over 95 % of the remaining pollutnats and particles, resulting in less than 0.02 NTU turbidity, less than 0.5 mg/L chemical oxygen demand($COD_{Mn}$), less than 0.04 mg/L total nitrogen(T-N) and less than 0.01 mg/L total phosphorus(T-P). In particular, addition of an RO system could lead to markedly reduced high salt concentrations in tunnel wastewater, approaching almost zero. Thus, reclaimed water using the combined membrane system could satisfy current South Korean regulations concerning wastewater reuse(turbidity ${\leq}2.0$ NTU; T-N ${\leq}10mg/L$; T-P ${\leq}0.5mg/L$; Salinity ${\leq}250mg{\cdot}Cl/L$).

• Membrane Journal
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• v.26 no.5
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• pp.401-406
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• 2016

In this study, we have investigated the removal of the low level radioactive ions of Cs and I in water by the reverse osmosis (RO) process. The two RO modules produced in domestic region and the waste RO module after the cleaning process were selected. Then we compared removal performance of both Cs and I. The experiments are conducted by varying the concentration of feed, the pressure. As a results, it was confirmed that all three modules are higher I decontamination factor than Cs. And particularly, for the cleaned RO module, its decontamination factor of I was 1140. Since the results at low pressure condition were better than that at high pressure conditions, the use of the direct installation of RO modules on the tap water might be possible. In addition, it was confirmed that the waste RO module after cleaning process using EDTA, SBS and NaOH, increased the decontamination performance better than before cleaning, in particular, the recovery ratio after cleaning was 6.3% higher.