Journal
WATER SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY-WATER SUPPLY
Volume 14, Issue 3, Pages 453-460Publisher
IWA PUBLISHING
DOI: 10.2166/ws.2013.221
Keywords
biofiltration; biopolymers; drinking water; fouling; pretreatment; ultrafiltration membranes
Funding
- Ontario Research Fund (ORF) Research Excellence grant
- Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) in the form of an Industrial Research Chair in Water Treatment at the University of Waterloo
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Fouling is a major challenge for low-pressure membrane drinking water treatment systems. Previous research has demonstrated that under the right conditions, biofiltration is an effective method to reduce fouling of low-pressure polymeric membranes. This study provides additional insight into the effect of biofiltration as a pretreatment for fouling reduction by using river water with different raw water quality characteristics than has been examined in previous studies. Two parallel pilot-scale dual media (sand/anthracite) biological filters were operated continuously over a period of 14 months. Liquid chromatography-organic carbon detection analysis confirmed that the parallel biofilters performed similarly with both averaging on 21% biopolymer removal. Raw and treated water biopolymer concentrations were correlated, with increased absolute removals occurring at higher raw water concentrations. Ultrafiltration (UF) membrane fouling experiments showed substantial improvement in performance following biofiltration pretreatment by reducing hydraulically irreversible and reversible fouling rates by 14-68% and 8-55%, respectively. The results also reaffirm the importance of biopolymers at concentrations as low as similar to 0.1 mg/L on irreversible and reversible UF membrane fouling and a minimal impact of humic substances.
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