• Journal of Korean Society of Water and Wastewater
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• v.30 no.4
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• pp.401-408
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• 2016

Desalination is getting more attention as an alternative to solve a global water shortage problem in the future. Especially, a desalination technology is being expected as a new growth engine of Korea's overseas plant business besides one of the solutions of domestic water shortage problem. In the past, a thermal evaporation technology was a predominant method in desalination market, but more than 75% of the current market is hold by a membrane-based reverse osmosis technology because of its lower energy consumption rate for desalination. In the future, it is expected to have more energy efficient desalination process. Accordingly, various processes are being developed to further enhance the desalination energy efficiency. One of the promising technologies is a desalination process combined with Pressure Retarded Osmosis (PRO) process. The PRO technology is able to generate energy by using osmotic pressure of seawater or desalination brine. And the other benefits are that it has no emission of $CO_2$ and the limited impact of external environmental factors. However, it is not commercialized yet because a high-performance PRO membrane and module, and a PRO system optimization technology is not sufficiently developed. In this paper, the recent research direction and progress of the SWRO-PRO hybrid desalination was discussed regarding a PRO membrane and module, an energy recovery system, pre-treatment and system optimization technologies, and so on.

• Journal of Korean Society of Water and Wastewater
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• v.22 no.3
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• pp.337-342
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• 2008

A population growth and industry advances are increasing the demand for water while improving the quality of life. By turning seawater into freshwater it is an alternative for the water shortage problem. The study analyzes the orders and makes suggestions on the outlook of an enterprise that can supply desalination plants both inside and outside the country. It compares the production capacity of enterprises in the desalination industry who deal with the thermal and RO methods. We compare 7 enterprises in the thermal method which includes Doosan Heavy Industries, and the top 10 enterprises in the RO method which includes General Electric Corp. Now that the markets in the Middle East have opened and markets in other regions are gradually growing, demand for water will grow especially in developing countries that are in the process of industrialization. Also, the market share of thermal method desalination has been falling, gradually, because too much energy is spent during the process. On the other hand, the market share of the RO method will rise from 37% in 2005 to 57% in 2015. Recently, the desalination market shows that changing from thermal method to RO method is the trend in the Middle East. Growth and demand in other regions are growing at the same pace as the Middle East. Due to this trend, if the RO system, which is highly effective and uses less energy, were to be continuously developed it would be possible to supply water using sea water and would be a viable alternative water resource.

• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
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• v.35 no.3
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• pp.200-205
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• 2013

Pretreatment process is the critical step of RO (Reverse Osmosis) membrane desalination plant in order to prevent RO membrane fouling. The pretreatment as a key component of RO process must be designed to produce a constant and high quality RO feedwater which has low silt density index (SDI). This experiment was conducted to assess parameters affecting SDI value, such as pH, seawater turbidity, temperature, and coagulant dose. The experimental results indicated that the source seawater turbidity did cause little effects on SDI values of filtered water. The 0.45 um hydrophilic membrane was more appropriate than the hydrophobic membrane for measuring SDI. The SDI value was increased with decreasing pH under the condition of below pH 7.0. In addition, the water temperature significantly affected the SDI values, showing higher SDI value with lower water temperature.

• Journal of Korean Society of Water and Wastewater
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• v.32 no.1
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• pp.1-10
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• 2018

Recently, interest in the development of alternative water resources has been increasing rapidly due to environmental pollution and depletion of water resources. In particular, seawater desalination has been attracting the most attention as alternative water resources. As seawater desalination consumes a large amount of energy due to high operating pressure, many researches have been conducted to improve energy efficiency such as energy recovery device (ERD). Consequently, this study aims to compare the energy efficiency of RO process according to ERD of isobaric type which is applied in scientific control pilot plant process of each $100m^3/day$ scale based on actual RO product water. As a result, it was confirmed that efficiency, mixing rate, and permeate conductivity were different depending on the size of the apparatus even though the same principle of the ERD was applied. It is believed that this is caused by the difference in cross-sectional area of the contacted portion for pressure transfer inside the ERD. Therefore, further study is needed to confirm the optimum conditions what is applicable to the actual process considering the correlation with other factors as well as the factors obtained from the previous experiments.

• Membrane Journal
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• v.30 no.3
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• pp.190-199
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• 2020

The utilization of multiple water sources becomes important due to the master plan for development of water supply released by Ministry of Environment, Korea in 2018. In this study, therefore, the analysis of comprehensive effect in blending applicable water sources in Daesan where 100,000 ㎥/d seawater desalination plant will be constructed for industrial use was performed. The increase in mixing ratio of other water sources with seawater reduced salinity up to 50%, but negatively impacted the turbid and organic matter. Lab-scale reverse osmosis performance test also found that membrane fouling was exacerbated in blended water condition. The simulation results of reverse osmosis indicated 39% energy saving on average is expected at the one-to-one blending ratio, however, long-term performance test at the pilot-scale plant is highly required to evaluate the inclusive impact of mixing seawater and other water sources.

• Journal of Korean Society of Water and Wastewater
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• v.29 no.1
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• pp.89-96
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• 2015

Smart water grid is a water network with communication to save water and energy using various water resources. In smart water grid, water product from the various sources can be blended to be supplied to end-users. The product water blending was reported by literatures while feed water blending has been rarely reported so far. In this work, a commercial reverse osmosis (RO) system design software provided by a membrane manufacturer was used to elucidate the effect of feed water blending on the performance of seawater reverse osmosis (SWRO) plant. Fresh water from exisiting water resource was assumed to be blended to seawater to decrease salt concentration of the RO feed water. The feed water blending can simplify the RO system from double to single pass and decrease seawater intake amount, the unit prices of the RO system components including high pressure pump, and operation risk. Due to the increase in RO plant capacity with the feed water blending, however, the RO membrane area and total power consumption increase at higher water blending rates. Therefore, a specific benefit-cost analysis should be carried out to apply the feed water blending to SWRO plants.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2004.04a
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• pp.2053-2058
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• 2004

The pressurized light water cooled, medium power (330 MWt) SMART (System-integrated Modular Advanced ReacTor) has been under development at KAERI for a dual purpose : seawater desalination and electricity generation. The SMART design verification phase was followed to conduct various separate effects tests and comprehensive integral effect tests. The high temperature / high pressure thermal-hydraulic test facility, VISTA(Experimental Verification by Integral Simulation of Transient and Accidents) has been constructed to simulate the SMART-P (the one fifth scaled pilot plant) by KAERI. Experimental tests have been performed to investigate the thermal-hydraulic dynamic characteristics of the primary and the secondary systems. Heat transfer characteristics and natural circulation performance of the PRHRS (Passive Residual Heat Removal System) of SMART-P were also investigated using the VISTA facility. The coolant flows steadily in the natural circulation loop which is composed of the steam generator (SG) primary side, the secondary system, and the PRHRS. The heat transfers through the PRHRS heat exchanger and ECT are sufficient enough to enable the natural circulation of the coolant.

• Proceedings of the Korea Water Resources Association Conference
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• 2019.05a
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• pp.201-201
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• 2019

세계적인 기상이변으로 가뭄발생 빈도 및 영향이 증가하고 있으며, 급속한 산업화로 사용 가능한 수자원이 점차 고갈되어 있어, 국내에서도 해수담수화(Seawater Desalination)는 새로운 대체수자원으로 많은 관심을 받고 있다. 해수담수에 필요한 에너지 약 50~70%는 역삼투(Reverse Osmosis) 공정에서 발생되며, 해수온도 및 염분도에 따라 많이 변동될 수 있으므로 국립해양조사원(KHOA)의 과거 20년 자료를 이용하여 해수담수화 시설물 위치에 따른 영향을 분석하였다. 해수담수화에 필요한 에너지는 막 제조사에서 제공하는 RO Projection Software를 적용하여 에너지 소모량을 평가하고, 이를 고려한 시설물 위치에 대한 평가 모델을 구축하였다. 기존 해수담수화 시설은 대규모 물 공급이 필요한 지역을 우선적으로 고려했기 때문에 시설물 위치에 대한 객관적인 평가기준 마련이 어려웠다. 그러나 해수담수화 플랜트는 한번 설치되면 장기적인 시설물 유지 및 관리가 필요함으로 경제성을 고려한 최적 입지의 선정은 매우 중요하다. 본 연구는 국립해양조사원의 수집된 자료를 바탕으로 해수담수화 시설물 입지선정을 정량적으로 평가함으로서, 시설물 위치에 대한 의사결정시 참고할 수 있는 기초자료로 활용될 것으로 기대한다.

• Journal of Korean Society of Water and Wastewater
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• v.27 no.2
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• pp.261-272
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• 2013

Algae boom (Red tide) in south coastal area of Korea has been appeared several times during a decade. If algae boom appears in the desalination plant, media filter and UF filter are clogged quickly, and the plant should be shutdown. In general, Algae can be removed from water by flotation better than by sedimentation, because of the low density of algal cell. The purpose of this study conducts the CFD simulation of DAF flotation basin to apply the design of the dissolved air flotation with ball filter in the Test Bed for SWRO desalination plant. In this study, Eulerian-Eulerian multiphase model was applied to simulate the behavior of air bubbles and seawater. Density difference model and gravity were used. But de-sludge process and mass transfer between air bubbles and seawater were ignored. Main parameter is hydraulic loading rate which is varied from 20 m/hr to 27.5 m/hr. Geometry of flotation basin were changed to improve the DAF performance. According to the result of this study, the increase of hydraulic loading rate causes that the flow in the separation basin is widely affected and the concentration of air is increased. The flow pattern in the contact zone of flotation basin is greatly affected by the location of nozzle header. When the nozzle header was installed not the bottom of the contact zone but the above, the opportunity of contact between influent and recycle flow was increased.

• Membrane Journal
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• v.29 no.6
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• pp.314-322
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• 2019

A worsened drought in Chungnam province of Korea due to climate change and increasing water demand at Daesan industrial complex have motivated the 100,000 ㎥/d seawater desalination project. In this study, therefore, the comprehensive analysis of parameters affecting the reverse osmosis (RO) performance was conducted. Under the various conditions of feedwater salinity and temperature in Daesan, energy consumption was calculated as 2.39 ± 0.13 kWh/㎥. The decrease in membrane flux and recovery rate positively impacted annual operation cost. The average total dissolved solids (TDS) of the permeate and energy consumption with highly permeable membrane according to the membrane manufacturer were 3.84 mg/L and 2.22 ± 0.13 kWh/㎥, respectively. In addition, energy saving up to 0.29 kWh/㎥ or cost reduction of membrane module up to 15.6% is expected by changing the RO configuration from full two pass to partial or split partial two pass.