Organic fouling behaviour of structurally and chemically different forward osmosis membranes – A study of cellulose triacetate and thin film composite membranes

Mazlan, Nur Muna; Marchetti, Patrizia; Maples, Henry A.; Gu, Boram; Karan, Santanu; Bismarck, Alexander; Livingston, Andrew G.

doi:10.1016/j.memsci.2016.07.065

Cited by 88 publications

(34 citation statements)

References 41 publications

(48 reference statements)

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“…1), the fouling by a single foulant in the PA-TFC membrane can be more significant, for a given DS concentration, compared to that with the CTA membrane. This result is also consistent with that of Mazlan et al [30], who indicated a greater adhesion of foulant on the TFC active surface, which could be attributed to factors such as surface roughness, surface charge, surface chemical heterogeneity, and hydrodynamic effects.…”

Section: Critical Flux Determination Using Single Foulantsupporting

confidence: 93%

“…3). been known to be vital factors for controlling membrane fouling [30]. Therefore, a distinct critical flux behavior between CTA and PA-TFC can be anticipated.…”

Section: Critical Flux Determination Using Single Foulantmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…A sufficient shear force (i.e., physical flushing) can be used for the removal of reversible fouling but this is not the case with irreversible fouling. Numerous authors have investigated the fouling reversibility of FO under various scenarios: single fouling (i.e., alginate [26] [27], colloidal silica [26] [27], gypsum scaling [14] [28] [29], combined fouling (i.e., alginate + colloidal silica [27], alginate + gypsum scaling [14]), different membrane types [28] [30], and operating condition (i.e., effect of applied hydraulic pressure [27] [31]). Their results indicated that a higher restoration of water flux is obtained with single foulants.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Critical flux-based membrane fouling control of forward osmosis: Behavior, sustainability, and reversibility

Nguyen

Kook

Lee

et al. 2019

Journal of Membrane Science

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Membrane fouling is closely related to the concept of critical flux. Therefore, a fouling control stategy for forward osmosis (FO) membranes that is based on the critical flux is necessary. This study systematically investigated the critical flux behavior of FO membranes (CTA and PA-TFC) in the short-term using a stepping method (draw solution (DS) concentration stepping). In addition, to test the reliability of this method, long-term experiments were conducted to evaluate the influences of operational critical flux on the fouling behavior (sustainable operation and fouling reversibility/irreversibility), thereby determining the critical flux for reversibility. Our results showed that the DS concentration stepping could be applied for critical flux determination in FO. Both membranes exhibited higher critical flux values for alginate fouling compared to other single foulants such as colloidal silica or gypsum. The values were 15.9 LMH for a cellulose triacetate membrane (CTA) and 20.5 LMH for the polyamide thin-film composite (PA-TFC). Whilst these values should be adequate in FO applications they were determined for single foulants. The presence of multispecies of foulants caused a significant decline in the critical flux values. This study found 5.4 LMH for the CTA membrane and 8.3 LMH for the PA-TFC membrane for the combined foulants of alginate + gypsum. This indicates that the critical flux behavior in FO was dependent on the foulant type and membrane type. Importantly, 98-100% restoration of water flux was achieved with the PA-TFC membrane at an operation either close to or below critical flux (i.e., in case of negligible fouling), except for the combination of alginate-combined colloidal silica. The critical fluxes for reversibility obtained in this study will aid the efficient operation of practical FO processes.

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Section: Critical Flux Determination Using Single Foulantsupporting

confidence: 93%

“…3). been known to be vital factors for controlling membrane fouling [30]. Therefore, a distinct critical flux behavior between CTA and PA-TFC can be anticipated.…”

Section: Critical Flux Determination Using Single Foulantmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Critical flux-based membrane fouling control of forward osmosis: Behavior, sustainability, and reversibility

Nguyen

Kook

Lee

et al. 2019

Journal of Membrane Science

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“…Since the CTA membrane is sensitive to an alkali condition [42], it was not used to evaluate phenol rejection at pH 11. The dissociation of phenol to phenolate occurs at pKa = 9.95; at pH> 9.95, phenol transforms to ionic form, phenolate ( Supplementary Data Fig.…”

Section: Effect Of Salinity and Ph In Ro Modementioning

confidence: 99%

Phenol rejection by cellulose triacetate and thin film composite forward osmosis membranes

Xiao

Nghiem

Song

et al. 2017

Separation and Purification Technology

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This study aims to elucidate the separation of phenol by reverse osmosis (RO) and forward osmosis (FO) modes and propose strategies to enhance phenol rejection by these two processes. The results show that phenol rejection was strongly influenced by water flux, membrane materials, membrane structure, modes of operation, and feed solution chemistry (i.e. pH). The relationship between phenol rejection and water flux was demonstrated by the irreversible thermodynamic model which could accurately simulate phenol rejection as a function of water flux. At pH 7, phenol rejection by cellulose acetate (CTA) membranes was negligible while the thin film composite (TFC) polyamide (PA) membranes exhibited much higher phenol rejection. Through a systematic static adsorption experiment, results in this study show that phenol adsorption to CTA material was about 20 times higher than that to PA material. Thus, the observed higher phenol rejection by TFC PA compared to CTA membranes was attributed to the significantly higher affinity of phenol toward CTA and the sorption diffusion transport mechanism of phenol through the membrane. In particular, a TFC PA membrane specific for FO operation was prepared in this study. In FO mode, the tailor-made TFC PA membrane showed a slightly higher phenol rejection and a much higher water permeability compared to the commercial membrane. At the same water flux and solution pH, phenol rejection in FO mode was consistently higher than in RO mode. This observation could possibly be attributed to the reverse diffusion of draw solutes in the FO mode which hinders the forward diffusion of phenol through the membrane. A significant increase in phenol rejection was achieved by increasing the feed pH above the dissociation constant of the compound.

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“…8,9 However, surface roughness, hydrophobicity and abundant functional groups of the TFC FO membranes inarguably make them highly susceptible to fouling. [10][11][12][13][14][15][16] In particular, the extensive presence of carboxyl groups in the TFC FO membrane surfaces are more prone to organic fouling, because divalent ions such as Ca 2+ ions in the feed solution can bind to carboxyl groups on the membrane surface and those of the organic foulants, resulting in the severe organic fouling. 17 The adsorption and accumulation of various organic substances on the membrane surface increase the hydraulic resistance across the membrane and reduce the treatment efficiency.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

New insights into the organic fouling mechanism of an in situ Ca²⁺ modified thin film composite forward osmosis membrane

et al. 2019

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Organic fouling behaviour of structurally and chemically different forward osmosis membranes – A study of cellulose triacetate and thin film composite membranes

Cited by 88 publications

References 41 publications

Critical flux-based membrane fouling control of forward osmosis: Behavior, sustainability, and reversibility

Critical flux-based membrane fouling control of forward osmosis: Behavior, sustainability, and reversibility

Phenol rejection by cellulose triacetate and thin film composite forward osmosis membranes

New insights into the organic fouling mechanism of an in situ Ca²⁺ modified thin film composite forward osmosis membrane

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Organic fouling behaviour of structurally and chemically different forward osmosis membranes – A study of cellulose triacetate and thin film composite membranes

Cited by 88 publications

References 41 publications

Critical flux-based membrane fouling control of forward osmosis: Behavior, sustainability, and reversibility

Critical flux-based membrane fouling control of forward osmosis: Behavior, sustainability, and reversibility

Phenol rejection by cellulose triacetate and thin film composite forward osmosis membranes

New insights into the organic fouling mechanism of an in situ Ca2+ modified thin film composite forward osmosis membrane

Contact Info

Product

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New insights into the organic fouling mechanism of an in situ Ca²⁺ modified thin film composite forward osmosis membrane