Wood membrane filter for water purification with radial and axial flows

Abstract

Water availability is an important issue all over the world, and membrane filtration technology is one of the most effective measures for remediation. As a sustainable and renewable biomass material, natural wood has a hierarchical and three-dimensional interconnected microstructure, which provides an alternative for water filter design. Longitudinal filtration could take advantage of the micropores, while the treatment speed is severely limited. This study examined a wood filter in which muddy wastewater can be transported into the microchannels and out of the vertically stacked micropores. The filter takes full advantage of the pores present in the wood without sacrificing the speed of hydraulic flow within the main transport channels, exhibiting excellent performance for mud removal. In this manner, water flux, decolorization, and turbidity are highly dependent on the groove number, groove depth, and thickness of the filter. Due to the reorientation of the water transport pathways, the clogging of micropores could be easily alleviated, thus promoting the filter lifecycle. The design of the cross-flow wood filter can provide an available platform for various wastewater treatment cases with different impurities, displaying an application prospect in the wastewater treatment field.