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Identification of performance and cost in a new backwash method to clean the UF membrane: backwashing with low dosage of NaClO

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Abstract

Ultrafiltration (UF) is widely used in wastewater reclamation treatments. Conventional backwashing is usually performed at regular time intervals (10–120 min) with permeate and without the addition of chemicals. Chemical enhanced backwashing (CEB) is usually applied after 70–90 filtration cycles with added chemicals. These cleaning methods cause membrane fouling and require costly chemicals. Instead of conventional backwashing, we propose herein a new backwashing method involving backwashing the effluent with low doses of sodium hypochlorite (NaClO) named as BELN. The performance and cost of UF backwashing were investigated with Beijing wastewater reclamation treatment. The results showed that the transmembrane pressure (TMP) increased from 33.2 to 48.2 kPa during hydraulic backwashing after 80 filtration cycles but increased from 33.3 to 39.3 kPa during backwashing with a low NaClO content of 20 mg/L. It was also noticed that the hydraulic-irreversible fouling index decreased from 5.58 × 10−3 m2/L to 3.58 × 10−3 m2/L with the new method. According to the three-dimensional fluorescence excitation-emission (3D-EEM), the response increased from 11.9 to 15.2% with BELN. Protein-like material was identified as the main component causing membrane fouling by blocking the membrane pores. The results indicated that the low dosage of NaClO effectively stripped the fouling layer. Finally, based on an economic evaluation, the capacity of the UF process was increased from 76,959 to 109,133 m3/d with the new method. The amount of NaClO consumed for Beijing wastewater reclamation treatment was similarly compared with the conventional backwashing in per year under BELN. The new method has good potential for application.

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All the data generated or analyzed during this study are included in this published article (and its supplementary information files).

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Funding

This study received financial support from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 52030003) and Beijing Engineering Research Center for Wastewater Reuse research and development fund (BPJ201907-2022).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Water Resources and Hydropower Engineering, North China Electric Power University, Beijing, 102206, China

    Lian Yang, Shuoxun Dong, Shaoxia Yang & Feng Xiao

  2. Beijing Engineering Research Center for Wastewater Reuse, Beijing, 100124, China

    Lian Yang, Haoran Qiu, Zixin Lu, Chunrui Zhang, Guoliang Liu, Jiang Chang & Congcong Wu

  3. Beijing Drainage Group Co. Ltd., Beijing, 100044, China

    Lian Yang, Haoran Qiu, Zixin Lu, Chunrui Zhang, Guoliang Liu, Jiang Chang & Congcong Wu

Authors
  1. Lian Yang
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  2. Haoran Qiu
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  3. Zixin Lu
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  4. Chunrui Zhang
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  5. Guoliang Liu
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  6. Jiang Chang
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  7. Congcong Wu
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  8. Shuoxun Dong
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  9. Shaoxia Yang
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  10. Feng Xiao
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Contributions

Lian Yang: design of the work; Haoran Qiu, Chunrui Zhang, Congcong Wu, Zixin Lu, Shuoxun Dong, and Guoliang Liu: the acquisition, analysis; Jiang Chang: interpretation of data; Feng Xiao: the creation of new software used in the work; Shaoxia Yang: drafted the work or substantively revised it.

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Correspondence to Feng Xiao.

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Yang, L., Qiu, H., Lu, Z. et al. Identification of performance and cost in a new backwash method to clean the UF membrane: backwashing with low dosage of NaClO. Environ Sci Pollut Res 30, 121983–121992 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-023-31008-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-023-31008-3

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