NAMS 2002 Workshop - ICOM 2008

Drinking and Wastewater Applications III – 1 – Keynote
Wednesday July 16, 9:30 AM-10:15 AM, Maui
Membranes and Water: the Role of Hybrid Processes
A. Fane (Speaker), Director, Singapore Membrane Technology Centre, NTU, Singapore -
AGFane@ntu.edu.sg
Membrane technology now has a major role in water and wastewater treatment.
In many cases the membrane does not operate alone but is coupled with other
unit operations, giving us Hybrid Membrane Processes. Further, in the majority of
cases the membrane process is low pressure microfiltration or ultrafiltration and
the hybrid component allows greater removals to be achieved. Submerged
membrane systems provide a simple concept with the ‘unit operation’ in the tank
and the membranes providing both inventory control and separation.
This presentation discusses a number of hybrid processes including adsorption,
photocatalysis [1] and combined adsorption and photocatalysis for water
treatment. In these examples the membrane plays an inventory management
role but provides little solute separation; typically fouling is a minor concern. For
wastewater treatment the submerged MBR is the dominant hybrid and fouling is
the dominant issue. The MBR fouling ‘roadmap’ [2] is revisited with an eye on
recent developments. In the MBR the membrane may provide partial ‘solute’
removal as well as complete particle removal. Finally a novel MBR [3] involving
membrane distillation provides an approach to complete solute retention of
solutes. The challenges faced by the MDBR concept are outlined.
[1] S. S. Chin, T. M. Lim, K. Chiang and A. G. Fane, Factors affecting the performance of a lowpressure
submerged membrane photocatalytic reactor., Chem Eng J., 131 (2007) 53-63.
[2] J. Zhang, H. C. Chua, J. Zhou and A. G. Fane, Factors affecting the membrane performance
in submerged membrane bioreactors, Journal of Membrane Science, 284 (2006) 54-66.
[3] A. G. Fane, J. Phattaranawik and F. S. Wong, Contaminated inflow treatment with membrane
distillation bioreactor, PCT/SG2006/000165 Filing date 16 June 2006 (2006).