A case study of long-term RO plant operation without chemical pretreatment

Described herein is a case study of long-term reverse osmosis (RO) plant operation without applying chemical pretreatments to the feed water. This project was undertaken with the financial support from the Department of Bio-Technology, New Delhi, and the work was carried out by a research team from Central Salt and Marine Chemicals Research Institute (CSMCRI), Bhavnagar (Gujarat), India. A prototype plant with a 30,000 L/d capacity was designed, manufactured, installed and operated at the village of Mocha-Gorsar, located in the Porbandar district, to provide drinking water. The village was to be developed as a model Bio-Village where other projects related to village problems are also operated by other research institutes. Thin-film composite (TFC) membrane-based RO technology was indigenously developed by the institute for treatment of brackish water and waste water for the first time in India; it was used successfully in this plant, which gave a typical NaCl rejection of about 95%. This is a typical case study of RO plant installation where physical methods of pretreatment such as sand and micron cartridge filters were used; no chemical pretreatment of feed was employed for long-term brackish water desalination study. The idea was to avoid the usage of chemicals, which concentrate in the effluent water, might affect the environment and may not suit the village community. Plant performance during 24 months of continuous operation with respect to variable feed salinity, membrane cleaning and regenerations is discussed.     

考虑不同水质输入的水电联产优化设计

结合已有的反渗透/多级闪蒸混产系统和发电-多级闪蒸联产系统,设计了一个新的包括热力发电系统、反渗透海水淡化系统和多级闪蒸海水淡化系统的水电联产超结构,对以不同盐度苦咸水、海水为原水的水电联产系统进行了优化设计,通过求解系统以年费用最小为目标函数的非线性数学模型,得到不同盐度下联产系统优化的生产结构. 结果表明,在低盐度(≤25000 mg/L)下采用冷凝式发电和一级反渗透产水,高盐度下采用抽汽冷凝式发电和热膜混合产水,可降低联产系统的年费用,获得较低成本的淡化水. 在本工作所定的生产规模下,优化联产方案的年费用可降低23%~36%.     

Status of reverse osmosis desalination technology

Reverse osmosis (RO), a relatively new technology, is gradually becoming an established and economical method for demineralization of saline waters. Over 50 commercial plants ranging in size from 50,000 gpd to 2 million gpd (2 mgd) are producing fresh quality water for municipal and industrial uses from brackish water sources. The U.S. Congress has authorized construction of a 100 mgd plant in Yuma, Arizona to demineralize otherwise unusable high salinity irrigation return flows as part of the Colorado River Salinity Control. Engineering design and operation details together with cost information on some commercial plants and the planned 100 mgd plant will be presented.A review of the plant operation data indicates that is imperative for the plant owners and equipment suppliers to place due emphasis on providing adequate feed water pretreatment facilities and trained plant operation personnel to ensure trouble-free operation and to achieve furthur economy in desalting costs.Significant advances have been made in the development of RO process for sea water desalination. Soaring energy costs are providing incentive for plant owners to prefer RO plants (up to 100,000 gpd) over vapor compression distillation hardware. Results of the Federal Government Desalting R & D Programs clearly indicate that RO desalting costs will be at least 20–30% lower than distillation.     

Performance study of RO systems in Saudi Arabia

Desalination of water is one of the most important engineering tasks facing Saudi Arabia today. Lacking unlimited supplies of potable Water, the Kingdom must depend upon the desalination process of brackish well water or sea water to satisfy the ever increasing demands. These demands are expected to reach the 430 MGD figure in 1980 and 700 MGD in 1985.

Abstract

until quite recently, the reverse osmosis played a rather modest role in the country's desalination program and was almost exclusively limited to brackish water applications and plants not exceeding a capacity of 1 MGD. Within the last year, significant changes took place in favor of these processes. The estimated total output of RO units to be commissioned this year will be about 70 MGD. This figure includes the 3.2 MGD plant for desalting the sea water in Jeddah and the 55 MGD plant in Riyahd from brackish well water.

This paper deals primarily with the performance of RO systems, their cost of operation/maintenance and the factors affecting the cost. These factors may be divided into three groups as related to feed water, system design and system operation. The quality of feed water and good pretreatment plays an extremely important role in performance of a RO system. This study pays special attention to these parameters in expectation that more cost effectiveness will evolve in the future either through a better understanding of the processes or an improved process design match to materials employed.     

Feasibility of reverse osmosis desalination of brackish agricultural drainage water in the San Joaquin Valley

The technical feasibility of reverse osmosis (RO) desalination of agricultural drainage (AD) water in California's San Joaquin Valley (SJV) was evaluated based on systematic analysis of water quality monitoring data and field water desalting tests in a laboratory plate-and-frame RO (PFRO) system. Thermodynamic solubility analysis and diagnostic PFRO desalting tests served to determine the feasible range of water recovery limits and to assess the mineral scaling potential. Analysis of the recovery limits imposed by scaling due to sparingly soluble salts (e.g. calcite, gypsum, silica) suggested feasible recoveries in the range of 46%-69%. Diagnostic PFRO desalting tests with five representative field water sources from the SJV (having gypsum and calcite saturation indices in the range of 0.12-1.03 and 2.9-9.5, respectively) confirmed the above recovery range. Mineral scale coverage was consistent with the observed flux decline. Deployment of RO technology for treatment of brackish SJV AD water would require site-specific process optimization given the geographic and temporal water quality variabilities. Therefore, RO operation with variable feed water quality (with respect to salinity and scaling propensity) and at sufficiently high recovery would require effective plant control, enabled by real-time mineral scale detection and adaptable process operation to mitigate mineral scaling.     

Simulation and experimental study for an inverted trickle solar still

An experimental study for an inverted trickle solar still was performed. The still was basically composed of an inclined absorber plate painted black on the top. Saline water flowed at the backside of the plate and was kept attached to the plate. The water flow rate was kept low so that its temperature was raised to produce vapor. Condensation took place in another compartment where a heat exchanger was placed to provide heat recovery. The still was tested using brackish water of 6000 ppm salinity during the month of November at 47° and 32° tilt angles. The condensate obtained was 2.8 and 2 L/d at the above angles, respectively. This represents an 18% increase in this kind of output over previous work, which is due to reduction in the salinity of feed water. However, the intermediate header production, which is saline water of reduced salinity (3600 ppm), was also reduced by 13%. A computer simulation program was developed to predict the performance of the still.     

The role of membrane technologies in supplying drinking and industrial water in Tunisia: Conventional process and new trends

Tunisia has utilized a large portion of its moderate water potential. Needs increase exponentially as a result of population growth and socio-economic development. Since the 80's, Tunisia has resorted to desalination of brackish water and particularly via membrane techniques to supply the traditionally deficient regions with good quality water and come up with a solution for industrial water utilities. The choice and the management of desalination technologies must be studied. With this aim, a national research program has been established to dealing with the optimal management of existing units with a view to propose technological schemes more adapted to the quality of the raw water. In the present work, three plants are studied. The first one is an RO fed by water drawn from a subsoil aquifer. The operating parameters show that partial iron oxidation and chlorine are responsible for the short life of modules. The second deals with the water from a deep geothermal layer. Membrane autopsies show that the fouling is essentially biological and that the shock treatment has led to a significant improvement. The third one is an EDR plant fed by dam water. The main difficulty is the turbidity fluctuation, the instantaneous adjustment of the dose injected into flocculant and coagulant which has led to a substantial improvement of the plant performances. The follow up and diagnosis are presented and discussed in the light of new trends in material.     

Desalting of subsurface water using spiral-wound reverse osmosis (RO) system: technical and economic assessment

Subsurface water rise is a major problem in Kuwait. The impact of this problem is manifested in surface water ponds, cracks in buildings, flooded basements and damaged roads. Dewatering this water of moderate salinity is necessary. Being in an arid area with very limited water resources, treatment and recycling of the subsurface water could be very important to a country like Kuwait. For this purpose, a pilot study was carried out by KISR to desalinate the subsurface water using the reverse osmosis (RO) technique. The main aim of this study is to assess the viability and economic feasibility of using RO technology. This paper outlines the results of over 8000 operating hours performance data of an RO plant utilizing spiral-wound membranes (SW) used to desalinate subsurface water with TDS of about 11,000 mg/1 and an economic feasibility evaluation. Results indicate that the (SW) RO system is a viable technique to desalinate this type of water. The improvements in TDS, COD and BOD were 99%, 96% and 42%, respectively. The economic feasibility evaluation indicates that the unit cost of desalting subsurface water by RO is 0.235 KD/m³ (0.776 US$/m³), which is considered to be economically feasible for a small-scale plant.     

Optimization of solar-powered reverse osmosis desalination pilot plant using response surface methodology

A solar thermal and photovoltaic-powered reverse osmosis (RO) desalination plant has been constructed and optimized for brackish water desalination. The central composite experimental design of orthogonal type and response surface methodology (RSM) have been used to develop predictive models for simulation and optimization of different responses such as the salt rejection coefficient, the specific permeate flux and the RO specific performance index that takes into consideration the salt rejection coefficient, the permeate flux, the energy consumption and the conversion factor. The considered input variables were the feed temperature, the feed flow-rate and the feed pressure. Analysis of variance (ANOVA) has been employed to test the significance of the RSM polynomial models. The optimum operating conditions have been determined using the step adjusting gradient method. An optimum RO specific performance index has been achieved experimentally under the obtained optimal conditions. The RO optimized plant guarantees a potable water production of 0.2 m³/day with energy consumption lower than 1.3 kWh/m³.     

A Comparative study of organic fouling in hollow fiber and spiral wound membranes

The occurrence of flux decline in brackish water reverse osmosis (RO) plants due to dissolved organics is a topic of ongoing research. This type of organic fouling has also been found in seawater RO plants. A study was undertaken to compare organic fouling in hollow fiber and spiral wound membranes using a seawater feed that possessed a high concentration of huraic acid. This study was undertaken at an RO plant on Grand Cayman Island, British West Indies. The feed water came from a sea well and possessed a concentration of humic acid that varied between 35 and 60 mg/l.The hollow fiber membrane was operated at a recovery of 25% while the recovery with the spiral wound membrane varied between 5 and 25%. The performance data which included permeate flow, salt rejection, pressure drops across the membrane and analysis of the membranes for organic fouling were undertaken. This study compared the performance data and organic fouling between the hollow fiber and spiral wound meembranes.     

Effects of feed water temperature on inorganic fouling of brackish water RO membranes

A bench scale RO process simulator was operated in a batch concentration mode to determine the effects of product water recovery and feed water temperature on flux, rejection, and inorganic fouling by gypsum scale formation for simulated brackish water. As feed water temperature increased, salt rejection and concentration polarization decreased (reducing scale formation potential at a given recovery). However, gypsum crystal nucleation and growth rates increased with temperature. Specifically, at 15 and 25°C gypsum scale formation resulted in slow, steady flux decline at recoveries as low as 10–20%. At these temperatures, many small crystals formed over the entire membrane surface. In contrast, at 35°C flux decline was due to the increasing feed solution osmotic pressure — up to a recovery of about 70%. At this recovery, we observed a sudden, rapid loss of flux and a concomitant spike in feed water turbidity. Relatively few (in number), large crystals formed on the membrane towards the brine outlet of the RO simulator, but the entire membrane surface was covered with “needle-like” crystal fragments. The crystal fragments broke off from growing gypsum rosettes and re-deposited uniformly across the membrane forming a “cake layer” that caused the massive flux decline. These results suggest that high temperature operation of brackish water RO processes could enable higher recovery and lower energy consumption, but operating near the limiting recovery (at elevated temperature) creates an increased risk of a catastrophic fouling event.     

An autonomous wave-powered desalination system

The potential for an autonomous wave-powered desalination system is considered and it is identified that the most promising configuration is a reverse osmosis (RO) plant utilising a pressure exchanger-intensifier for energy recovery. A numerical model of the RO plant with a pressure exchanger-intensifier is developed that shows that a specific energy consumption of less than 2.0 kW h/m³ over a wide range of sea-water feed conditions, making it particularly suitable for use with a variable power source such as wave energy. A numerical model of the combined wave-power and desalination plant is also developed that shows that it is possible to supply the desalination plant with sea-water directly pressurised by the wave energy converter, eliminating the cost and energy losses associated with converting the energy into electricity and back to pressurised water. For a typical sea-state the specific hydraulic energy consumption of the desalination plant is estimated to be 1.85 kW h/m³ whilst maintaining a recovery-ratio of less than 25 to 35% to avoid the need for chemical pre-treatment to eliminate scaling problems. It is suggested that the economic potential for wave-powered desalination depends on these energy and cost savings more than compensating for the reduction in membrane life that occurs with variable feed conditions.     

海岛高含铁苦咸水的淡化

本文和反渗透技术处理海岛高含铁量苦咸水的淡化工艺。针地铁的去除做了一系列的予处理研究,使之在最佳经济运行成本的条件下,使原水经予处理后能满足足渗透进水的要求。     

Characterization of uncertainties in the operation and economics of the proposed seawater desalination plant in the Gaza Strip

In the Gaza Strip, the available freshwater sources are severely polluted and overused. Desalination of seawater through reverse osmosis (RO) has become the most realistic option to meet a rapidly growing water demand. It is estimated that the Gaza Strip will need to develop a seawater desalination capacity of about 120,000 m³/d by the year 2008, and an additional 30,000 m³/d by the year 2016 in order to maintain a fresh water balance in the coastal aquifer and to fulfill the water demand for different uses in a sustainable manner. Cost and reliability of a large RO facility are still subject to much uncertainty. The cost of seawater desalination by RO systems varies with facility size and lifetime, financing conditions, intake type and pre-treatment requirements, power requirements, recovery rate, chemicals cost, spare parts cost, and membrane replacement cost. The permeate salinity is a function of feed water temperature, recovery rate, and permeate flux. The quantity of water produced depends mainly on plant size, recovery rate, and operating load factor. Many of these parameters are subject to a great deal of uncertainty. The objective of this work is to develop a probabilistic model for the simulation of seawater reverse osmosis processes using a Bayesian belief network (BBN) approach. This model represents a new application of probabilistic modeling tools to a large-scale complex system. The model is used to: (1) characterize the different uncertainties involved in the RO process; (2) optimize the RO process reliability and cost; and (3) study how uncertainty in unit capital cost, unit operation and maintenance (O&M) cost, and permeate quality is related to different input variables. The model utilizes information from journal articles, books, expert opinions, and technical reports related to the study area, and can be used to support operators and decision makers in the design of RO systems and formulation of operational policies. The structure of the model is not specific to the Gaza Strip and can be easily populated with data from any large-scale RO plant in any part of the world.     

Evaluation of an ion exchange system regenerated with seawater for the increase of product recovery of reverse osmosis brackish water plant

An experimental ion exchange unit was operated on the Red Sea shore. Softening of the reject containing 1,400 ppm calcium from a nearby RO brackish water plant was performed using seawater as regenerant. The ex- perimental results reported show that the calcium concentration in the softened reject was reduced to a level which enables further RO desalting of the reject at 50% product recovery. A preliminary economic evaluation of 4,000m³/day RO plant indicates that desalting of softened reject would be more economically advantageous than the continued operation of the existing thermal seawater desalting plants and should precede the commercial RO seawater desalting at this location.     

Comparison of slow sand filtration and microfiltration as pretreatments for inland desalination via reverse osmosis

A pilot study was conducted from October 2007 to November 2010 to establish the long-term feasibility of using reverse osmosis (RO) treatment to manage salt levels in Central Arizona Project water. Pretreatments consisting of microfiltration (MF) and slow sand filtration (SSF) were compared based on performance—turbidity removal, silt density index (SDI), volume treated between cleaning events and protection of downstream RO—during side-by-side operation over a yearlong period. SSF always produced feed water that was suitable for RO treatment (SDI < 5). However, MF consistently provided filtrate with SDI < 3, and long-term RO performance improved significantly with MF as pretreatment. Although the economic costs of MF and SSF pretreatments are similar; MF is preferred based on the quality of treated water and stability of downstream RO operation.     

Performance evaluation of BWRO desalination plant — A case study

Fouling and scaling are the most serious problems in membrane processes. In sea/brackish water applications, pretreatment of RO feed water is the key step in designing the plants to avoid membrane fouling and scaling. Recent developments in pretreatment processes are more adapted to raw water quality. But, in some cases, raw water quantity/quality varies during seasons and is also influenced by the environment. Thus, pretreatment design becomes complicated and should cope with the raw water quality changes. The success of such operation requires qualified operators who will be able to adapt with different situations. Surface and brackish water sources are mostly facing these problems. In this paper, performance evaluation carried out for a brackish water reverse osmosis (BWRO) plant located in the west of Algeria is presented. This plant showed poor performance after a few months of operation. The operating pressure and pressure drop increased significantly without an increase in the production capacity and the permeate conductivity decreased surprisingly. Frequent shutdowns of the plant were observed due to severe membrane fouling. To identify the causes for the poor performance, different investigations were carried out. Membrane autopsy was performed and chemical analyses of foulants on the membrane surface by scanning electron microscopy were carried out to identify the matters responsible for fouling. The results showed that the quality of raw water changed widely due to drying of some wells and decrease of the water level in other wells. RO membranes were fouled by inorganic matters mainly colloidal/particulate silica and fine particles of clay present in raw water. Thus, the pretreatment scheme was thoroughly reviewed to find out why suspended solids were not removed by the sand and cartridge filters even though SDI was always less than 1. The problem was resolved by injecting a coagulant before the sand filters.     

Pilot studies on high recovery BWRO-EDR for near zero liquid discharge approach

A hybrid process combining reverse osmosis and electrodialysis has been shown to be effective in recovering 97-98% of brackish water as product water with chloride levels of 200 mg/L or less. Potential for scaling on the brine side of the electrodialysis unit was prevented by acidification, operating the electrodialysis in a reversal mode (EDR), and a side loop crystallizer which prevented buildup of scaling components. Settlers, inline microfiltration, and side-loop ultrafiltration kept suspended solids from returning to the EDR unit. This process was demonstrated in a series of more than eighty batch experiments of 1.5 to 1.8 m³ of RO concentrate of raw brackish groundwater from the Negev Highland, Israel. Each batch could be processed within a single day. The feed-water was concentrated from 0.3% to over 10% TDS super-concentrate while producing the water that could be recycled to the RO permeate. This super-concentrate from the EDR unit was further concentrated in a wind powered WAIV unit that brought final brine TDS to > 30%, and showed promise as a method to recover mineral byproducts such as magnesium salt. Initial economic estimates show that this hybrid process is competitive with conventional RO and other enhanced recovery processes for inland desalination requiring use of evaporation ponds.     

Evaluation of the suitability of groundwater quality for reverse osmosis desalination

In this study the suitability of brackish ground water quality for reverse osmosis (RO) desalination is evaluated. The results of initial laboratory and field analysis of 41 production wells were used to determine the hydrochemical properties of groundwater for both the Dammam limestone aquifer and the clastic Kuwait Group aquifer in the southwestern part of the State of Kuwait. The core samples of these wells were collected and analyzed in order to determine the hydrogeological properties of the same aquifers in the Umm Gudair area. Hydrochemical data of these aquifers were analyzed to help describe relations between hydrochemically distinct bodies of water and elucidate links between hydrochemical data and hydrogeological parameters. During this study, the Expanded Durov diagram was simplified and linked with the Sulin classification method in order to give more interpretation values. The results show that the aquifer materials influence the quality of ground water in each aquifer. The Kuwait Group aquifer water is characterized by ClMg and ClCa genetic water types with an average TDS of 4008 mg/l and belongs to the chloride water type. The Dammam limestone aquifer water characterized by the NaSO₄ and ClMg genetic type with an average TDS of 3480 mg/l belongs to the sulphate type. Both aquifers contain suitable water for RO desalination since they have a high concentration of chloride and monovalent ions, which reduces the requirements of antiscalant additives.     

Nitrate removal with reverse osmosis in a rural area in South Africa

The nitrate-nitrogen concentration (>6 mg/l) and the salinity (>1000 mg/l TDS) of many borehole waters in rural areas in South Africa are too high for human consumption. Therefore, an urgent need for water denitrification and water desalination exists in these areas. Reverse osmosis (RO), electrodialysis (ED), ion-exchange (IX) and certain biological technologies can be very effectively applied for water denitrification. Each of these technologies, however, has its own advantages and disadvantages. Reverse osmosis technology, however, has been selected for this study because the technology is well known in South Africa and because it can be very effectively applied for water desalination. The objectives of this study were: (a) to transfer RO technology through process demonstration performance for water denitrification and water desalination to people living in rural areas; (b) to build capacity regarding the operation and maintenance of an RO application in a rural area; (c) to produce a preliminary operational and maintenance manual for the operation of an RO unit in a rural environment; (d) to train local operators to operate and maintain an RO plant in a rural environment; (e) to evaluate stock watering as brine disposal option; and (f) to determine the preliminary economics ofthe process. The following conclusions were drawn. It was demonstratedthatthe RO process could be very effectively applied for water denitrification and water desalination in a rural area. Nitrate-nitrogen was reduced from 42.5 mg/l in the RO feed to only 0.9 mg/l in the RO product water. The TDS of the RO feed was reduced from 1292 mg/l to 24 mg/l in the RO permeate. Therefore, an excellent quality water could be produced for potable purposes. The RO brine at approximately 50% water recovery should be suitable for stock watering if the conditions for stock watering are met in terms of nitrate-nitrogen concentration, TDS and other constituent concentrations. The capital cost for an approximately 50 m³/d output RO plant is approximately US $29,900. Preliminary cost estimates have shown that the operational cost for water denitrification is approximately US $0.50/m³. This cost, however, should be significantly reduced by optimisation of the chemical dosing and by blending borehole water with RO product water.