oved application of the existing technology: with and without chemical pre-t

e on above site

ABSTRACT
With an ever-growing world-wide demand for water and decreasing availability, emerging technologies such as ultrafiltration (UF) hold the key to future water treatment and reuse. The reuse of effluent of wastewater treatment plants (WWTP) for high-quality water production will certainly be an interesting application of UF in the years to come. In the present work, we have studied crossflow membrane ultra-filtration with periodic reversal flow considering the possibility of worst quality feed to the membrane with and without chemical pretreatment. The particulate matter remaining after the biological system is also seen removed by the pressure driven membrane filtration which appears to be cost saving option compare to negative pressure suction technology. Pilot tests are carried out over a range of flux and down time operation for varied quality of feed at two plant site. The plant was operated continuously at the optimum flux for the period of two months at each location. The results obtained using above study provides important insights regarding the coupled membrane filtration and biological systems. The presented results will provide a useful basis for further work in developing better understanding of process optimization. Keywords: Biological treatment; Ultrafiltration; Membrane Filtration; Waste water reuse; WWTP effluent, MBR.

INTRODUCTION
Increasingly stringent standards for wastewater disposal and reuse, makes to rethink on the membrane technologies. Although secondary and tertiary treatment wastewater can be discharged into waterways it cannot be used for other process utilities directly. The membrane separation processes are now being successfully used to obtain water of recyclable quality. However there are limitations associated with the membrane technologies and many researchers are striving to overcome these limitations. Pretreatment can be the option to reduce the fouling of membrane and increase production capacity. Pretreatment also reduces the need for frequency of chemical cleaning, which is a major factor impacting membrane life. From these perspectives, pretreatment offers the great potential for improving the efficiency of membrane processes. Studies were performed on the reuse of WWTP effluent in order to establish the feasibility of UF technology for domestic wastewater. A pilot plant of two different capacities was designed with the biological system followed by UF. In the present paper the ability of biological systems coupled with the potential performance of a membrane filtration system is shown by its technical feasibility reports. Operational costs have been estimated on the basis of two pilot plant trails. In the next section we present the limitations of membrane technology. This is followed by the experimental details and finally we discuss sample of results with our conclusion.

LIMITATIONS OF MEMBRANE 1

TECHNOLOGY:
Ultrafiltration in water treatment applications has proven to be a reliable technology. UF membranes are capable of removing suspended solids and colloidal, viruses, bacteria, and high-molecular suspended organic material from the water. These characteristics of UF instigate us to take pilot trials of UF on wastewater with the innovative approach of flow reversal. To alleviate the deleterious effect of concentration polarization and membrane fouling we tried the concept of periodic flow reversal to enhance membrane flux. The major drawbacks of the membrane filtration system are as follows: 1. In membrane separation processes when dealing with multicomponent feed streams, no matter how good is the membrane properties and system design, flux decline due to fouling and concentration polarization is inevitable. 2. Flux decline problem is a two step process: far field effects (hydrodynamic interactions) and near field effects (surface forces, chemical and electro kinetic interactions). We consider an innovative technique of reversal flow to manipulate the far field hydrodynamics in such a way that solute convection-diffusion transport and particle migration to the membrane surface can never form a stable layer. If this can be achieved, a substantial increase in transmembrane flux would be possible. The flow reversal has a great potential in combating flux reducing effects due to concentration polarization and fouling. Periodic reversal of the flow of the feed stream at the membrane surface results in prevention and mitigation of membrane fouling. Consequently, these advantages are expected to enhance membrane flux significantly.

capacity of 56 cum/day and 102 cum/day respectively. The influent feed quality to the ultrafiltration at both the pilot trials is as mentioned below in Table No. 1 and Table No.2. Table No. 1: Characteristics of Biologically Treated Sewage Effluent: Pilot-1 ITC COD (ppm) 27-170 BOD3 (ppm) 3.5-22 TSS (ppm) 8-110 Turbidity (NTU) 0.5-3.7 NO3-N (ppm) 11-28 NH3-N (ppm) 20-54 Table No. 2: Characteristics of Biologically Treated Sewage Effluent: Pilot-2 Satyam COD (ppm) 96-76 BOD3 (ppm) 40-85 pH 7.1-7.7 TSS (ppm) 74-148 Turbidity (NTU) 0.9-1.3 NO3-N (ppm) 25-33 NH3-N (ppm) NDL PO4-P (ppm) 1.5-15.4 The system designed consists of the Norit X-flow AquaflexTM 8X60 crossflow UF membrane element. The membranes are typically 0.8 or 1.5 mm in diameter, polysulphone material, providing a membrane area of 22 or 35 m2 in one element. The PLC automated system include crossflow hollow fiber membrane module integrated with pneumaticallyoperated valves so to provide in various ways the filtration, backwashing and cross flushing operations. Reversal flow membrane filtration: The forward and reverse membrane filtration system is as shown in the below fig no.1. Fig No. 1: Forward and Reverse Filtration The periodic flow reversal phenomenon is

EXPERIMENTS DETAILS
Materials and Methods: The biological system followed ultrafiltration membrane was installed for domestic wastewater treatment having the production

employed in the present pilot trials. The

membrane filtration system operation is two 0f0502020204030204ff0200e1ffac00400900 step cyclic processes in which step one is 0000000000009f010000000000004300610 forward filtration of duration say, tf then 06c006900620072000000000060db210089 a08961694b004b4c1b220294477900341d1 follows a period of backflushing or reverse 5009c2d5d6d2000000001000000701d1500 filtration of duration say, Pre-treatement tb. The Bio-Fluidised reactor Treated effluent periodic Membrane 701d1500087a5b6d20000000981d15006c1 backflushing and reversal flow through the Module b22026476000800000000250000000c0000 membrane helps to achieve the reversal 0001000000250000000c000000010000002 fouling phenomenon by avoiding 50000000c00000001000000180000000c00 concentration polarization and cake or gel 00000000000254000000540000000000000 layers formation onto the membrane 00000000011000000230000000100000000 surface. In fig no. 2 the effect of flow 004b41d5044b41000000001c00000001000 reversal on the membrane filtration system 0004c000000040000000000000000000000 is shown for the consecutive six cycles of 2c020000070300005000000020001100120 1500s each. As known the flux decline is 0000046000000280000001c000000474449 seen in each cycle and the moment system 4302000000fffffffffeffffff2d02000007030000 reach the steady state flux, the flow reversal 00000000460000001400000008000000474 and backflush is applied to regain the 4494303000000250000000c0000000e0000 original flux. The peak of each cycle in fig 80250000000c0000000e0000800e0000001 no. 2 is the original flux regain at the start of 40000000000000010000000140000000400 the forward filtration. The membrane thus 000003010800050000000b0200000000050 can be protected from the external fouling. 000000c021701c800040000002e0118001c The only concern is that the time and filtrate 000000fb020600030000000000bc02000000 used for backflush and cleaning cycles 000102022253797374656d003f3f3f3f00000 which lower the operational saving 03f3f3f3f083f3f3f000000003f3f3f3f3f000400 contributing to more membrane cost 00002d010000040000002d0100000400000 compare to the conventional treatment. On 0020101001c000000fb02f5ff000000000000 the other hand advantages are membrane 9001000000000440002243616c696272690 filtration gives the high and consistent 00000000000000000000000000000000000 effluent quality which can be used for the 00000000000000040000002d01010004000 process utilities making to rethink on the 0002d010100040000002d01010005000000 water scarcity and reuse. 0902000000020d000000320a0a000000010 0040000000000c800170120000600040000 0100090000032a0200000200a2010000000 002d010000040000002d010000030000000 0a201000026060f003a03574d4643010000 000 00000001000849000000000100000018030 0000000000018030000010000006c000000 00000000000000001100000023000000000 Fig No. 2: Effect of Reversal flow 0000000000000981b00007326000020454d membrane filtration 46000001001803000012000000020000000 Operation Philosophy: 00000000000000000000000400600004808 0000cb0000000d010000000000000000000 The membrane is fed by means of two 000000000c0190300b81b0400160000000c pumps which operate alternatively. One 000000180000000a0000001000000000000 pump provides feed to the membranes in 0000000000009000000100000002c020000 forward filtration and the second pump is 07030000250000000c0000000e000080250 used for backwashing and chemically 000000c0000000e000080120000000c0000 enhanced backwashing (CEB) at 0001000000520000007001000001000000e comparatively high velocity of >960 m/s. UF 1ffffff0000000000000000000000009001000 filtrate is used in both backwashing and 00000000004400022430061006c00690062 cleaning cycles. The reject and backwash 00720069000000000000000000000000000 water is recycled in the system taking it 00000000000000000000000000000000000 back into the equalization tank thus 00000000000000000000000000000000000 maintaining a low food/microorganism ratio 0000000001500a41c150010000000082015 (F/M) and/or to reduce the aeration tank 00881d15001b51896108201500001d15001 volume. With a lower F/M ratio, the 0000000701e1500ec1f15006c50896108201 biodegradation efficiency is better and the 500001d1500200000009f71646d001d1500 sludge production is smaller. 0820150020000000ffffffff6c1b22021a72646 dffffffffffff0180ffff01803fff0180ffffffff0000000 The schematic diagram of the cross-flow 00000000000000000e0f7f20501000000000 ultrafiltration system is shown in the fig no. 00000c800000025000000372e9001000002

3. During forward filtration valves V1, V2 and V3 are open, while valves V5 and V6 are closed. Valve V4 is Non-return valve (NRV). Feed pump P1 provides the driving force for the process. The transmembrane pressure (TMP) is measured by means of two pressure transmitters (PT). At a preset interval, the filtration stops and valves V1, V2 and V3 close while valves V5 and V6 open. Backwash pump P2 then starts and performs a backwash operation at high velocity. The backwash cycle helps to remove the suspended solids layer that has built-up on the feed side of the UF membrane and is disposed of through valve V6. CEB is performed by dosing chemicals during backwashing, followed by soaking the unit for a preset time and rinsing the unit by performing another backwash.

Filtrate <06 Filtrate

(% reduction)

<08 70%

Not Tested ---

89%

Table No. 4: The average feed and filtrate quality of Pilot-2. Para meter influent
40-85 96-176 74-148

BOD (ppm)

COD (ppm)

TSS (ppm)

Turbidity NTU
0.9-1.3

Filtrate

< 05

< 43

< 08

< 0.4

Para meter influent Filtrate Filtrate

(% reduction)

NH4-N 0.04 0.02 >90%

NO3-N 25-33 <19.8 40%

PO4-P 10.2-15.4 <2.8 >82%

Fig No. 3: Block diagram of the plant scheme.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS

The plant was operated at both the locations over the range of the flux and varied feed quality as shown in Table No. 3 and Table No 4. Effluent of domestic wastewater with and without pretreatment was pumped into the hollow fiber membrane module. The operating pressure and the cross-flow velocity were controlled at 350 kpa and 0.08m/hr by means of the by-pass and pneumatic control valves. The energy consumption for the pilot-1 and pilot-2 is 0.25kwh/m3 and 0.16kwh/m3 for the permeate production of 56cum/day and 102 cum/day respectively. Table No. 3: The average feed and filtrate quality of Pilot-1. Para meter influent
3.5-10 27-170 8-110

Table No. 5: UF performance data Cycl e Time (sec) Permeate productio n (cum/day) Net permeate productio n (cum/day) Pilot-1 30 38 43 46 Pilot-2 600 102 69 32 32 23 19 % productio n loss

900 1200 1500 1800

56 56 56 57

46

BOD (ppm)

COD (ppm)

TSS (ppm)

Turbidity

NTU
0.5-37

Filtrate

< 03

< 22

NDL

< 0.2

Para meter influent

NH4-N 20-54

NO3-N 11-28

PO4-P Not Tested

The UF unit in pilot-1 trial was operated at the recovery of 87% and the operation cycle chosen is 1500s (at the flow of 87 lmh) followed by the periodic backflushing of 30s at more than 500 lmh again followed by reversal flow of 70s and rinsing cycle of 30s. In forward filtration there is continuous decline in the flux till the steady state stable flux is reached, and then follows backflush and the reversal cycles. We select the optimum cycle with minimum production

loss in pilot-1 i.e. 1500s cycle with production loss 23% and operational loss of 10% against the production loss of 32% and operational loss of 20% in case of pilot-2 for the operation cycle time 600s as shown in Table No. 5. The reason behind choosing the cycle of 1500s over 600s is the feed quality at pilot-1 was much better than the pilot-2 as shown in fig no. 3 and fig no. 4. The chemical pretreatment was adopted at pilot-.1 Pilot-2 was tested with and without pretreatment for observation purpose. So we can see that pretreatment helps the membrane technology in increasing production capacity thus saving the operational cost. This shows that feed quality adversely affects the plant production. Pretreatment plays the essential role to sustain the membrane technology. In the entire system operation the only chemical used for the membrane cleaning is the Hypo-chlorite solution of concentration ranges from 500ppm to 1000ppm once in 3 hrs operation cycle. Flux model: The net permeate flux over the entire cycle period is defined by,

and reversal flow technique. The Chemical enhanced backwash is thus needs to perform every 2.30hrs to 3.00hrs duration and accordingly the cost of filtrate production is calculated. The organic removal with the membrane filtration is an efficient technology as seen from the fig no. 8 to fig no. 12. The filtrate BOD and COD values are <5ppm and <40ppm respectively throughout the trials of more than 04 months period. Also the suspended solids and turbidity are <5ppm and <0.4 NTU (NDL) respectively which the conventional technology cannot take care of to such a low limits. The E-coli in filtrate per 100ml sample in both the trials is absent. This is the best achieved filtrate quality water using the biological and coupled membrane filtration system and is in close vicinity of the more advance membrane biological reactor quality water. However the operating cost of both the technology for the studied capacity plants is more or less similar.

2 y = 0 . 0 3 3 9 x. 9 4 7 4 x + 8 . 1 0 5 6 - 0

Where Jf and Jb are the magnitudes of the forward and reverse fluxes, respectively. When tf < t critical, no cake or gel layer is allowed to form. When t > tf, a cake or gel layer of rejected material forms on the membrane surface [13]. In the present case studies critical time of forward filtration i.e. tf, chosen for the pilot-1 and pilot-2 were 1500s and 600s respectively based on the feed quality and minimum production loss in the system. The permeate flux behavior of various forward filtration time cycles is shown in figure no.4 to fig no.7. Figure 4 shows the six consecutive cycles permeate flow performance of the 1500s forward filtration. As shown in fig no. 4 there is complete regain of original flux by the backflushing

9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 0 20 250 600 1000 1300 1475 T im e ( s )

Fig No. 4: Permeate flow Vs Time for 1500s.

Permeate flow (cum/hr)

c o m b in e c o m p a r is io n c y c le s
y = - 0 .0 03 0 40x . 0 4 25 -1 1 .1 6 6 8 x + 1 0 .5 5 5 + x 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 0 2 0 1 5 0 3 0 0 6 5 0 1 0 0 01 3 0 01 6 0 0 T im e ( s )
10 9 8 7 6 Permeate Flow (cum/hr) 5 4 3 2 1 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 5 2 0 1 0 2 0 3 0 5 0 7 0 1 0 01 2 01 4 01 6 01 7 0

Ru n -1 9 0 0 s Ru n -2 1 2 0 0 s Ru n -3 1 8 0 0 s Ru n -4 1 5 0 0 s

Permeate Flow (cum/hr)

T im e ( s )

Fig No. 5: Permeate flow Vs Time for 1800s. Fig No. 7: Comparative study of flux for 900s; 1200s; 1500s; and 1800s systems.
10 9 8 7 Permeate flow (cum/hr) 6 5 4 3 2 1 0 2 0 1 0 0 2 0 0 4 0 0 6 0 0 8 0 01 0 0 0 1 5 0 1 T im e ( s )
0 0 1 2 3 4 5 5 20 25

y = - 0 .0 03 0 3 0 .0 5 29 -1 1 .4 0 6 6 x + 1 0 .8 4 6 + x x

Influent BOD, ppm

15

10

Filtrate BOD, ppm

Fig No. 6: Permeate flow Vs Time for 1200s.

Fig No. 8: Influent BOD Vs Filtrate BOD at pilot-1

0100090000032a0200000200a20100000

Fig No. 9: Influent BOD Vs Filtrate BOD at pilot-2

0100090000032a0200000200a2010 0000000a201000026060f003a0357 4d464301000000000001000849000 00000010000001803000000000000 18030000010000006c00000000000 00000000000110000002300000000 00000000000000981b00007326000 020454d4600000100180300001200 00000200000000000000000000000 00000004006000048080000cb0000 000d0100000000000000000000000 00000c0190300b81b040016000000 0c000000180000000a00000010000 00000000000000000000900000010 0000002c020000070300002500000 00c0000000e000080250000000c00 00000e000080120000000c0000000 10000005200000070010000010000 00e1ffffff000000000000000000000 00090010000000000000440002243 0061006c006900620072006900000 00000000000000000000000000000 00000000000000000000000000000 00000000000000000000000000000 000000000000001500a41c1500100 0000008201500881d15001b518961 08201500001d150010000000701e1 500ec1f15006c5089610820150000 1d1500200000009f71646d001d150 00820150020000000ffffffff6c1b220 7

Fig No. 10: Influent COD Vs Filtrate COD.

0100090000032a0200000200a2010 0000000a201000026060f003a0357 4d464301000000000001000849000 00000010000001803000000000000 18030000010000006c00000000000 00000000000110000002300000000 00000000000000981b00007326000 020454d4600000100180300001200 00000200000000000000000000000 00000004006000048080000cb0000 000d0100000000000000000000000 00000c0190300b81b040016000000 0c000000180000000a00000010000 00000000000000000000900000010 0000002c020000070300002500000 00c0000000e000080250000000c00 00000e000080120000000c0000000 10000005200000070010000010000 00e1ffffff000000000000000000000 00090010000000000000440002243 0061006c006900620072006900000 00000000000000000000000000000 00000000000000000000000000000 00000000000000000000000000000 000000000000001500a41c1500100 0000008201500881d15001b518961 08201500001d150010000000701e1 500ec1f15006c5089610820150000 1d1500200000009f71646d001d150 00820150020000000ffffffff6c1b220 21a72646dffffffffffff0180ffff01803ff f0180ffffffff00000000000000000000 0000e0f7f2050100000000000000c8 00000025000000372e90010000020 f0502020204030204ff0200e1ffac00 4009000000000000009f010000000 00000430061006c00690062007200 0000000060db210089a08961694b0 04b4c1b220294477900341d15009c 2d5d6d2000000001000000701d150 0701d1500087a5b6d20000000981d 15006c1b220264760008000000002 50000000c00000001000000250000 000c00000001000000250000000c0 0000001000000180000000c000000 00000002540000005400000000000 00000000000110000002300000001 00000000004b41d5044b410000000 01c000000010000004c0000000400 000000000000000000002c0200000

Fig No. 11: Influent TSS Vs Filtrate TSS.

0100090000032a0200000200a2010 0000000a201000026060f003a0357 4d464301000000000001000849000 00000010000001803000000000000 18030000010000006c00000000000 00000000000110000002300000000 00000000000000981b00007326000 020454d4600000100180300001200 00000200000000000000000000000 00000004006000048080000cb0000 000d0100000000000000000000000 00000c0190300b81b040016000000 0c000000180000000a00000010000 00000000000000000000900000010 0000002c020000070300002500000 00c0000000e000080250000000c00 00000e000080120000000c0000000 10000005200000070010000010000 00e1ffffff000000000000000000000 00090010000000000000440002243 9

(2004) 111120 [3] D. Abdessemed, G.Nezzal, R. Ben Aim, Coagulation-adsorptionultrafiltration for wastewater treatment and reuse, Desalination 131 (2000) 307-314
Fig No. 12: Influent Turbidity Vs Filtrate Turbidity.

CONCLUSIONS
Cross-flow membrane filtration pilot trials were performed at two locations on domestic wastewater plants with the flow reversal technique. Reversal flow helps to prevent external fouling of membrane. From the data reported above it is seen that ultrafiltration membrane technology is feasible to use in domestic wastewater to obtain the recyclable quality water for the process utilities. The biological system coupled membrane technology is also seen to treat the best and worst quality influent wastewater with no change in filtrate quality. The chemical pretreatment reduces the load on membrane increasing productivity of the plant. The filtrate water being used for the periodic cleaning of membrane contributes to the net production loss which is among the major drawback either in the negative pressure suction technology or any membrane technology for not being cost competitive. Futuristic work in this line could be helpful to make membrane technology more productive and cost effective.

[4] H.K. Shon, S. Vigneswaran, R. Ben Aim, H.H. Ngo, In S. Kim, and J. Cho, Influence of Flocculation and Adsorption as Pretreatment on the Fouling of Ultrafiltration and Nanofiltration Membranes: Application with Biologically Treated Sewage Effluent, Environmental Sci. Tech. 39(2005) 3864-3871 [5] Hyeok Choi, Kai Zhang, Dionysios D. Dionysiou, Daniel B. Oerther, George A. Sorial, Influence of cross-flow velocity on membrane performance during filtration of biological suspension, Journal of Membrane Science, 248 (2005) 189199 [6] H. Muhammad, A1-Malack, G.K. Anderson, Coagulation-crossflow microfiltration of domestic wastewater, Journal of Membrane Science, 121 (1996) 59-70 [7] Aisyah E. Palupi, Ali Altway and Arief Widjaja, The application of membrane Bio-Reactor for East Java Domestic waste water treatment, Songklanakarin J. Sci. Tech.30 (2008), 131-134 [8] Shamsuddin Ilias, Flux Enhancement in Crossflow Membrane Filtration: Fouling and Its Minimization by Flow Reversal, Report, North Carolina A&T State University Department of Chemical Engineering Greensboro, NC 27411 [9] Sukhtej Singh Dhingra, Mixed Gas Transport Study through

REFERENCES [1] Sanjeev Redkar, Vinod Kuberkar, Robert H. Davis, Modeling of concentration polarization and depolarization with high-frequency backpulsing, Journal of Membrane Science, 121 (1996) 229-242 [2] H.K. Shon, S. Vigneswaran, In S. Kim, J. Cho, H.H. Ngo, Effect of pretreatment on the fouling of membranes: application in biologically treated sewage effluent, Journal of Membrane Science, 234

Polymeric Membranes: A Novel Technique, PhD Thesis, Faculty of the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, 1997 [10] P.J. Smith, H.K. Shon, S Vigneswaran, H. H. Ngo, H. Nguyen, Productivity enhancement in a crossflow ultrafiltration membrane system through automated de-clogging operations, Journal of Membrane Science, 280 (2006) 8288 [11] S.C.J.M. van Hoof, A. Hashim, A.J. Kordes, The effect of ultrafiltration as pretreatment to reverse osmosis in wastewater reuse and seawater desalination applications, Desalination 124 (1999) 231-242 [12] R. Rosberg, Ultrafiltration (new technology), a viable cost-saving pretreatment for reverse osmosis and nanofiltration - A new approach to reduce costs, Desalination 110 (1997) 107-114

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