Evaluation of ceramic membrane applications for water treatment plants with a life cycle cost analysis

Ceramic membranes have many advantages such as durability, chemical resistance, high flux, and long life span. However, they generally require relatively high initial investment cost compared to polymeric membranes when they are used for a water treatment process. Therefore, if ceramic membranes are considered to be applied to a water treatment plant (WTP), the life cycle cost (LCC) analysis should be performed to evaluate its economic feasibility. In this study, the capital and operational expense data of selected WTPs which have membrane filtration processes were used for their LCC analysis. Production capacity of the plants, membrane flux and life span, and costs of membrane modules and electricity were considered as key analysis factors. From the LCC analyses with various conditions including membrane costs and membrane flux, the correlation of the key design parameters was obtained that can make the ceramic membrane filtration more cost-effective compared to the polymeric membrane method. At present state, WTP with a ceramic membrane should increase the permeate flux to meet the economic feasibility, but it is expected to have a bright future because of the recent development of manufacturing technologies and increase of demand in many industries.