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MBROPEXthetheoryofrunningcosts

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MBR OPEX the theory of running costs

MBR OPEX the theory of running costs

30 September 2016

1 The operating
expenditure (OPEX) of an
MBR

About this feature

With the coming of age of the technology, the next
thing on the agenda seems to be the subject of MBR
costs. Simon Judd explains the fundamentals of
working it out. In theory. Simon can be contacted at
simon@juddwater.com.

One of the concerns of MBRs is their operational costs,

which even the most optimistic (but nonetheless realistic)
of cost analyses reveals to be marginally higher than
those of conventional activated sludge (CAS). The reasons
behind this are fairly obvious. Firstly, permeating water
through a membrane demands energy. In the case of the
immersed technologies (iMBRs) this means that the overall specic aeration demand (SAD) is higher, since air is needed both for
maintaining the process biology in the aeration tank and scouring the immersed membrane. For a sidestream MBR (sMBR) energy is
used for pumping the sludge through the membrane channels. Secondly, membranes have a limited life. Although the ceramic
membranes presumably last a lot longer, it is normal to assume a life of 8-12 years for a polymeric membrane.
To calculate the actual costs requires key information concerning the plant design and operation. For the process biology these are the
same as for CAS modelling:
1. the feed and treated water quality, and specically the COD, BOD and ammoniacal/amino nitrogen (or total Kjeldahl nitrogen, TKN);
2. the mixed liquor suspended solids (MLSS) content in the aeration tank.
If CAD packages like Biowin or West are to be used for the biological process design then the above is probably sucient, since estimates
of the key fundamental biokinetic and biochemical parameters are provided in the package. However, if starting from scratch, and if only
the actual running cost is required, then the estimated sludge yield in kgMLSS generated per kgCOD feed is needed. To complete the
calculation demands an estimate of the amount of COD and TKN required to sustain the biomass in kgCOD and TKN per kg MLSS. Finally,
the eciency of oxygen transfer from the air bubble into the biomass, the standard oxygen transfer eciency (SOTE) per unit depth has
to be estimated.
On the membrane side the key parameters inuencing OPEX are:
1. the cost and life of the membrane;
2. the permeate ux;
3. the specic aeration demand for membrane scouring (SADm) for an immersed membrane, or
4. the pressure and crossow rate of a sidestream (pumped) membrane in an sMBR;
5. the energy demand of membrane permeation (for an immersed membrane: for sMBRs it is accounted for by (4) above.
Finally, for any MBR technology there are additional costs associated with:
1. energy for pumping the sludge between tanks (aeration to membrane tank, membrane tank to anoxic zone for denitrication and also
to an anaerobic tank for P removal);
2. process control energy demand and maintenance
3. chemicals for membrane cleaning
4. labour
5. other miscellaneous site services
Apart from labour and site services, which are location and site-specic, a reasonable estimate of all other costs can be made. OPEX is
ultimately determined in units of cost per m3 of treated water. The example below refers to a simple Modied Ludzack-Ettinger (MLE)
process for nitrication-denitrication.

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Figure 1 The Modied Ludzack-Ettinger MBR biological process conguration for denitrication.

2 Process biology OPEX

The base parameter values provided for the wastewater for treatment by an activated sludge process technology are as follows:

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The operational expenditure (OPEX) can be determined from the equations for:
1. Oxygen demand from COD and TKN loading in g/m3 O2:

2. Aeration demand from calculated oxygen demand in Nm3 air/m3:

3. The specic aeration energy demand for air pumping in Ws/Nm3:

The specic energy demand for biological process aeration (EL,bio) in units of kWh/m3 treated water is then the product of these two
parameters:

Inserting the relevant values into Equation 1:

From Equation 2:

From Equation 4:

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3 Membrane separation OPEX

3.1 iMBR
The base data provided for the cost determination are listed below. EA,m is assumed to be the same as EA,bio, which is justiable if the
aerator is at the same depth. EA,bio in units of kWh/m3 is 80,000/(3,600 x 1,000) = 0.0222.

3.2 sMBR
In the case of a pumped sidestream technology tted with horizontal modules there is no air scouring of the membrane, the shear being
created by the crossow. The energy demand is therefore determined from Bernoullis equation:

where appropriate values may be:

The conversion refers to the proportion of the retentate passing through the permeate channels which is converted into permeate. This
in turn can be determined from the membrane module characteristics (specically the membrane area and the available cross-sectional
area) and the net ux. Appropriate values for a food and beverage application might be:

So, the total cross-sectional area of the tube is:

If only 85% of this cross section corresponds to the membrane channels then the available cross-sectional area is:

The retentate ow is the product of the crossow velocity v and the above available cross-sectional area:

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The permeate ow per module is the product of the ux and the module membrane area:

If the sludge passes through eight such tubes then the total conversion is:

This gure (EL,m for the sidestream MBR) displaces the terms for energy demand relating to membrane air scour, permeate pumping and
sludge transfer in the corresponding equation for the immersed technology:

4 Cost curves
This simplistic approach implies that OPEX is independent of ow, which is not actually the case. However, a number of published cost
analyses suggest that there is only a shallow decline of OPEX with ow. According to the study of Lo et al (2015), who considered three
dierent ows ranging from 100 to 2500 m3/d, the OPEX cost curve (in 2015 USD) from entirely heuristic data is given by:

This curve seems to be in reasonable agreement with other published studies (DeCarolis et al, 2007; Brepols et al, 2010; Young et al,
2013), generally based on much larger MBR installations.

Figure 2 MBR OPEX according to various reported studies.

Since OPEX is most sensitive to design ux and membrane life it is of some interest to correlate the cost against these two parameters
based on the assumptions given in Section 3.1. Accordingly, it can be seen that doubling the membrane life from ve to ten years
decreases the overall OPEX by 24%. However, this is based on a membrane replacement cost of $80 per m2 membrane area, which is
perhaps overly conservative. If the membrane cost is reduced to $20 per m2 membrane area then this gure comes down to 9%.

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Figure 3 OPEX vs ux at various membrane life periods.

Clearly, OPEX is only part of the cost calculation. For a complete analysis the capital cost (CAPEX) is needed, which then demands
information on the price of equipment, installation services largely comprising mechanical and electrical (M&E) and civil engineering,
legal and contracting costs, land and other sundry items. These vary considerably between technologies, locations and overall
approaches to costing per se (i.e. which items are included, which is a rather vexed issue). However, given that OPEX generally contributes
more to the overall total cost (TOTEX) over the life of the plant, and can be estimated reasonably easily its perhaps worth at least doing
this much before reaching for the cheque book.
Further information on MBR design and operation is provided in Industrial MBRs, by Simon Judd.

References
Brepols, B, Schfer, H., and Engelhardt, N., 2010. Considerations on the design and nancial feasibility of full-scale membrane
bioreactors for municipal applications. Water Sci. Technol. 61(10), 2461-2468.
DeCarolis, J., Adham, S., Pearce, W.R., Hirani, Z., Lacy, S., Stephenson, R., 2007. Cost trends of MBR systems for municipal wastewater
treatment, Proceedings of the Water Environment Federation, 1317 October, San Diego, 3407-3418.
Lo, C.-H., McAdam, E., and Judd, S. (2015). The cost of a small membrane bioreactor, Water Sci Technol 72(10) 1739-1746.
Young, T., Smoot, S., Peeters, J., Ct, P., 2013. When does building an MBR make sense? How variations of local construction and
operating cost parameters impact overall project economics, Proc. Water Environment Federation 8, 6354-6365.

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