Comparison of organic and inorganic colloidal fouling during ultrafiltration

ENVR 126

Mingyan Zhou, zhoumy@rpi.edu, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, 110 8th Street, Troy, NY 12180, James E. Kilduff, kilduff@rpi.edu, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, 110 8th Street, Troy, NY 12180, and Georges Belfort, Howard P. Isermann Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, 110 8th Street, Troy, NY 12180-3590.
Several factors affecting membrane colloidal fouling by humic acid and nano-silica and subsequent cleaning with water and sodium hydroxide solution were studied in an effort to compare the fouling by these two types of colloids. These factors included membrane MWCO, surface roughness, foulant size and charge. The foulant rejection was also measured and correlated to membrane fouling and cleaning. Although membrane roughness varied with MWCO, it was found that, in general, fouling decreased with increasing membrane MWCO; therefore, the effect of pore size and rejection on flux was more important than roughness. Results also demonstrated that larger foulants caused greater flux decline. Membranes exhibiting lower roughness were easier to clean when affinity of foulant with membrane surface was high and/or when the foulant size was similar to the membrane surface roughness value.
 

General Papers
6:00 PM-8:00 PM, Wednesday, August 22, 2007 BCEC -- Exhibit Hall - B2, Poster

Division of Environmental Chemistry

The 234th ACS National Meeting, Boston, MA, August 19-23, 2007