Desalination 376 (2015) 109–116

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Desalination

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/desal

Review

Development of lower cost seawater desalination processes using

nanofiltration technologies — A review
Dong Zhou a,b, Lijing Zhu a,⁎, Yinyi Fu a, Minghe Zhu b, Lixin Xue a,⁎
a
Polymer and Composite Division, Key Laboratory of Marine Materials and Related Technologies, Zhejiang Key Laboratory of Marine Materials and Protective Technologies, Ningbo Institute of
Material Technology & Engineering, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Ningbo, Zhejiang 315201, PR China,
b
Ningbo University, Ningbo, Zhejiang 315211, PR China

H I G H L I G H T S

• The available data for the commercial NF membranes were listed for comparison.
• The integrating of NF with various types of desalination technologies was reviewed.
• The perspectives of lower cost seawater desalination were provided in the future.

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: The implementation of seawater desalination, a key strategy to secure fresh water supply in arid and coastal re-
Received 30 June 2015 gions, is greatly thwarted by its high cost relating to high energy and equipment cost associated with pressure
Received in revised form 20 August 2015 and the high system or membrane fouling associated with the bi-valence ions in the sea water. Nanofiltration
Accepted 21 August 2015
(NF), a lower pressure membrane process with high rejection for divalent ions, had been identified as a key com-
Available online xxxx
ponent to reduce the costs relating to both pressure and fouling in the desalination process. Lower cost seawater
Keywords:
desalination processes had been developed by integrating NF with various types of desalination technologies
Nanofiltration including reverse osmosis (RO), forward osmosis (FO), electrodialysis (ED), multistage flash (MSF), multieffect
Lower cost distillation (MED), membrane distillation (MD) and ion exchange (IX). In this paper, after comparing the perfor-
Seawater desalination mance of currently available NF membranes, we attempt to review the recent progresses made in the develop-
Integrated process ment of lower cost seawater desalination processes using NF technologies and provide future perspectives for
NF technologies.
© 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Contents

1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
2. Performance of commercially available NF membranes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
3. Integration of NF in membrane based desalination processes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
3.1. Dual stage NF desalination process. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
3.2. Integrated NF and RO desalination processes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
3.3. Integrated NF and FO desalination processes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111
3.4. Integrated NF and ED desalination processes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111
4. Integrating NF with thermal based desalination processes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111
4.1. Integrated NF and MSF desalination processes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111
4.2. Integrated NF and MED desalination processes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112
4.3. Integrated NF and MD/MC desalination processes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112
5. Integrated NF and ion exchange processes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113

⁎ Corresponding authors at: No. 1219, West Zhongguan Road, Zhenhai District, Ningbo, Zhejiang Province 315201, PR China.
E-mail address: xuelx@nimte.ac.cn (L. Xue).

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.desal.2015.08.020
0011-9164/© 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
110 D. Zhou et al. / Desalination 376 (2015) 109–116
6. Future perspectives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Acknowledgment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
References. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
1. Introduction
Only about 0.5% of the overall global water is available as fresh
water while seawater accounts for about 97% of them. Approximately
41% of the world population live in the arid regions, thus, fresh water
shortage is becoming a worldwide problem [1–2]. Seawater desalina-
tion has become an important way to secure freshwater supply for
lots of countries, such as the Gulf States, Spain and China [3–4], whose
capacity is expected to reach about 100 million cubic meters per day
in 2015 [5].
Thermal and membrane based processes have been developed for
sea water desalination, including multistage flash (MSF), multieffect
distillation (MED) and reverse osmosis (RO) [6–7]. Recently, the capac-
ity of membrane based desalination processes (mainly RO) had
surpassed thermal based processes (mainly MSF and MED), because of
their lower operating and investment costs [5–10]. In the MSF and
MED processes, plants usually cannot operate at more effective Top
Brine Temperature (TBT) because of reactor scaling [15–16]. Although,
great efforts have been conducted to improve the efficiency and reduce
the energy consumption of desalination technology [2], the worldwide
implementation of sea water desalination is still thwarted by its high
operating costs associated with high system pressure and bivalent
ionic fouling [11–16].
Nanofiltration (NF), an effective pressure-driven membrane process,
has the pore size and cut off ability between RO and ultra-filtration
[18–20]. Compared with RO, it operates not only under lower operation
pressures, higher water fluxes, and lower investment, but also with high
rejection rates for scale formation bivalent ions, especially anions
[21–23]. With these characters, it is gaining its yards quickly in the sea-
water desalination field [25]. This paper compared the performance of
currently available NF, reviewed the progresses made in the uses of NF
in developing lower cost seawater desalination processes, and
attempted to provide future perspectives for NF techniques in sea
water desalination.
2. Performance of commercially available NF membranes
Due to the unique separation ability, NF technology has been devel-
oped for removing scaling ions and low-molecular-weight organics as
well as part of the NaCl from seawater [26,27]. A lot of efforts have
been devoted to evaluate their performance under different application
conditions. Some of the currently available data for the commercial NF
membrane are listed in Table 1 for comparison. It is obvious that the
ionic rejection ratios of NF membranes varied greatly among the brands.
Hilal et al. [28] investigated the desalination performance of three kinds
of nanofiltration membranes NF90, NF270 (Dow Filmtec), and N30F
(MICRODYN-NADIR) and found that the flux and salt rejection rate of
NF90 and NF270 agreed well to the Spigler–Kedem model. It was sug-
gested that NF90 might be the best choice for NaCl removal, having
the highest rejection but medium permeates flux. Llenas et al. [29] eval-
uated the performance of six commercial NF membranes, NF270,
NF200, NF90 (Dow Filmtec), K-SR2 (Koch), ESNA1-LF2 (Hydranautics),
and NF99HF (Alfa Laval) and found all of them showed high rejection to
divalent ions, especially sulfate ions. They suggested that NF270, K-SR2
and NF99HF membranes were more suitable for pretreatment in RO de-
salination. Song et al. [30] suggested that ESNA3 membrane was quite
suitable for softening sea water while Pontié et al. [31–32] found that
the use of NF200 membrane could bear potential system flaws under
the conditions of high pressure and high salt concentration. Llenas
113
114
114
et al. [33] also suggested that NF270, K-SR2 and NF99HF be suitable
for removing scaling ions in seawater.
A lot of detailed studies were carried out for hardness ion concentra-
tion polarization, membrane scaling and organic fouling on the surface
of NF membranes. It was found that organic fouling mostly occurred
on the lead elements while inorganic scaling mostly occurred on the
last elements [34]. A1-Amoudi et al. [35] successfully restored NF per-
meate flux after scaling using SDS (sodium dodecyl sulfate) cleaning
and PH swinging methods. Song et al. [36] observed that ion rejection
and permeate flux of ESNA3 declined with time due to inorganic fouling
on the surface of NF membranes, and found that CaSO4 scaling could
form but CaCO3 could not at high recovery rate. By scale inhibitor addi-
tion and pH adjustment, NF water recovery rates reached 60% without
CaSO4 scaling [37–38]. NF technology was an effective treatment pro-
cess for removing most of divalent ions and reducing the TDS of seawa-
ter. Their stronger separation power for organics provides better
protection for the safe operation of the next process.
3. Integration of NF in membrane based desalination processes
3.1. Dual stage NF desalination process
Asymmetric NF membranes with tight polyamide separating layer
(such as NF90 and ESNA1) possessed high rejection ratios for both
monovalent and bivalent ions. Based on this, Vuong [39–40] developed
two stage NF–NF seawater desalination systems, effectively removing
ions from seawater with 20% to 30% lower energy cost than convention-
al one-stage RO. It was reported that a fully operational NF–NF process
has been established in a facility in Long Beach, United States with a
daily water production of 1135 m3 [41]. Harrison et al. [42] found that
the average permeate TDS was less than 400 mg/L when the high rejec-
tion NF-90 was used in both stages. Altaee et al. [43] studied the perfor-
mance of NF–NF desalination process with ROSA simulation software.
At 35,000 mg/L feed salinity, the pressure of the first and second stages
was 37 bar and 19 bar, and the recovery was 59% and 67%, respectively.
The permeate TDS and energy consumption of the NF90–NF90 system
was 254 mg/L and 3.35 kWh/m3, respectively. Liu et al. [44] found that
the operation pressure had the greatest effects on flux and TDS of per-
meate water in the NF90–NF90 system. In consideration of water qual-
ity and energy consumption, the dual-stage NF seawater desalination
process was a promising seawater desalination technology.
3.2. Integrated NF and RO desalination processes
Integrating NF with RO desalination process may increases the com-
plexity and cost of desalination plant. However, NF pretreatment had
shown effectiveness in removing divalent ions and reducing osmotic
pressure from the RO feed water, and integrated NF with RO could
join the advantages from both kinds of membranes [45–46]. Hassan
et al. [27,48] and Uhlinger [47] proposed the NF–RO low cost seawater
desalination process, and showed that, at the low pressure of only
22 bar, the Ca2 +, Mg2 +, SO24 −, HCO−
3 and total hardness rejection of
NF were 89.4%, 94.0%, 97.8%, 96.6% and 93.3%, respectively, and the re-
jection rate of monovalent ions (Cl−, Na+) was 40.3%, achieving about
27% reduction in the net water production cost from one-stage SWRO.
It was also found that the permeate quality of NF was significantly
affected by operating pressure, recovery rates, feed water quality, feed
water temperature, and the number and combination of membrane el-
ement [49]. Hassan et al. studied a pilot device of 8 NF and NF–RO
 D. Zhou et al. / Desalination 376 (2015) 109–116 111

Table 1
Data for the performance of commercial NF membranes.

Brand Vendor Membrane materials Feed Permeability Rejection ratio % Reference

g L−1 L m−2 h−1 bar−1
NaCl Cl− Na+ SO2−
4 Mg2+ Ca2+ TDS

NF90 Dow Filmtec PA Seawater 41.2 1.08 – 64.1 58.7 96.7 96.8 94.3 65.5 [33]
Seawater 35 – – 85.0 77.4 99.4 – 97.8 83 [30]
Seawater 35 0.728 – 81.7 80.9 98.7 96.3 95.0 83.5 [39]
NF270 Dow Filmtec PA Seawater 41.2 5.6 – 13.9 27.4 97.5 84.1 69.0 28.2 [33]
Seawater 35 – 40.2 30.8 98.9 60.2 44.8 [30]
NF200 Dow Filmtec PA Seawater 41.2 3.5 − 24.9 37.0 99.1 88.2 70.0 37.5 [33]
NF2540 Dow Filmtec − NaCl 35 1.6 ± 0.2 52 − − − − − − [32]
N30F MICRODYN-NADIR − NaCl 25 1.68 3.0 − − − − − − [28]
K-SR2 Koch − Seawater 41.2 7.3 − 11.5 7.1 97.0 75.6 59.0 18.4 [33]
MPS34 Koch − NaCl 35 1.0 ± 0.1 40 − − − − − − [32]
ESNA1-LF2 Hydranautics PA Seawater 41.2 10.9 − 11.7 12.1 66.0 24.3 17.8 16.5 [33]
ESNA1 Hydranautics PES Seawater 35 − − 89.7 80.9 99.4 − 93.2 89.6 [30]
ESNA3 Hydranautics PA Seawater 35 6.14 − 20.4 11.7 99.1 − 45.7 22.7 [30]
NF99HF Alfa Laval − Seawater 41.2 5.2 − 24.4 14.2 97.3 85.5 67.3 29.3 [33]
MPS44 Weizmann − NaCl 35 0.53 ± 0.05 52 − − − − − − [32]
DL GE Osmonics PA Seawater 35 − − 18.8 14.9 95.3 − 69.8 20.6 [30]
DK GE Osmonics PA Seawater 35 − − 28.0 27.3 93.6 − 60.4 35.8 [30]

combinations for 500 h and found that the permeate flux and recovery of
the NF increased with the increasing operation pressure. The rejections of
SO2−
4 were higher than that of Ca
2+
and Mg2+ while higher rejection and
recovery of Ca2+ and Mg2+ occurred at lower permeate flux [50–51]. In
Umm LUjj desalination plant, Erikssona et al. found that with NF as pre-
treatment for RO, the hardness ion content could be reduced to 220 ppm
[53], water recovery was increased from 28% to 56% while the power con-
sumption was reduced from 9.596 kWh/m3 to 5.858 kWh/m3 [52].
Chen et al. [55–56] proposed an integrated RO–NF desalination pro-
cess to increase the overall water recovery. In the process, the concen-
trated water produced by the RO process was further desalted by NF
process, where the permeate water was feedback to RO. Using SW30
(Dow Filmtec) 4-inch RO membrane elements and 2-inch NF mem-
brane elements, at 71% water recovery, the water production cost was
0.57 $/m3, 20.06% lower than single stage RO process [57]. Compared
with the two stage RO process, RO–NF process saved more investment
costs and electric energy [58–59].
3.3. Integrated NF and FO desalination processes
FO is a natural process in which water was driven through a semi-
permeable membrane by an osmotic pressure gradient. Majority of
the studies of FO membranes have been focused on either power gener-
ation or water production [60,62–63,67]. FO has been proposed for sea-
water desalination since the 1970s [64]. In a FO–RO desalination system,
the role of FO pass was drawing water from seawater, and the RO
produced freshwater by concentrating the diluted FO draw solution
[65–66]. Tan et al. [68] further proposed a FO–NF–NF system as shown
in Fig. 1. Similar to the FO–RO system, water was first driven from
seawater to draw solution through the FO membrane, and then the
two-stage NF process removed salt from diluted draw solution to form
fresh water. Seven draw solutes (NaCl, KCl, CaCl2, MgCl2, MgSO4,
Na2SO4 and C6H12O6) were tested, of which, NaCl and KCl showed the
highest water flux of 25 L m−2 h−1. The rejection of FO membrane for
the seven draw solutes (according to the above order) were 99.47%,
99.48%, 99.98%, 99.97%, 99.99%, 99.97% and 99.86%, respectively. For
RO–NF–NF process, Na2SO4 was the most appropriate draw solute for
its high single NF rejection of above 90%. The expected dual stage rejec-
tion in the process was 99.92% [69].
3.4. Integrated NF and ED desalination processes
ED technology also has potential to concentrate the brine of RO, NF–
RO and NF–RO–MED processes to become suitable feed for membrane
electrolysis for producing alkali [71–74]. For thermal based seawater
desalination processes, ED–MSF–Crystallization has become effective
low cost multifunction desalination–salt production processes [70]. As
discussed before, dual-stage seawater NF process showed poor capabil-
ity in rejecting boron [75–76]. Turek et al. [77] found that ED process
could remove the boron to the acceptable level (0.5 mg/L) from the per-
meate water of two-stage NF at the cost of about 0.098 $/m3 and the en-
ergy consumption of about 0.245 kWh/m3. Better boron removal
occurred at higher pH value. The boron concentration of permeate
was reduced from 2.4 mg/L to 0.5 mg/L when the ED process was run-
ning for 30 min at 110 C/L and pH value of 12.
4. Integrating NF with thermal based desalination processes
4.1. Integrated NF and MSF desalination processes
MSF is a simple, easy operating, mature, reliable and robust thermal
desalination technology, and has been widely applied in Gulf countries

Fig. 1. Schematic diagram of hybrid FO–NF–NF seawater desalination process [68].

112 D. Zhou et al. / Desalination 376 (2015) 109–116
Fig. 2. Schematic diagram of hybrid NF–RO–MSF seawater desalination process [86].
for a long time while MSF–RO plants had even higher water recovery
rates [78–81]. However, sulfate scaling has limited their TBT (Top
Brine Temperature) and flashing range, impacting unit capital and
freshwater cost [82]. Hassan et al. [43,83–84] proposed a NF–RO–MSF
desalination process as shown in Fig. 2, in which NF membranes were
used to remove scale forming ions from seawater, allowing higher TBT
operation of the MSF processes. Not only was the water productivity im-
proved but also the service life of cascade staging of MSF distillers was
extended. However, the feed water had to be heated process in winter
[85–88]. In this process, Hamed et al. [89] showed that the NF process
could reject 82.8% of the hardness ions and 26.5% of the TDS at the re-
covery rate of 64–69%. The TBT and water conversion ratio of MSF unit
could reach the high temperature of 130–160 °C. The combination of
NF–MSF and NF–RO–MSF with power plant could achieve less capital
costs, high plant availability and better water production, when the
local low cost electricity from the power plant applied to the NF and
RO membrane processes, and the waste heat could be used by the
MSF process.
Mabrouk et al. [90–91] evaluated the desalination performance of
CSP–NF–MSF–DBM (concentrated solar power–NF–MSF–deaeration
and brine mix) process. When about 90% of sulfate and calcium ions
were rejected by NF, the TBT of the NF–MSF–DBM plant could be raised
to 100–130 °C to achieve a gain output ratio (GOR) of 15–16, doubled
from the existing multistage flash-brine recirculation (MSF-BR) plant.
Fresh water production was increased by 19% at 14% less cost. When
the discharged concentrated brine was further used as feed for the
crystallization, NF–MSF–Crystallization (NF–MSF–Cr) or NF–RO–MSF–
Crystallization (NF–RO–MSF–Cr) systems produced not only fresh
water but also high quality salt crystals [92]. Their water production
costs were about 0.71 $/m3 and 0.43 $/m3. Subtracting the salt price of
30 $/ton [93], the cost of fresh water production could be further
lowered to 0.37 $/m3 [94].
4.2. Integrated NF and MED desalination processes
The MED processes have been developed based on high efficient
heat transport from condensing steam of the previous evaporator to sa-
line water of the next evaporator in a series of stages or effects to have
high desalination efficiency [95–97]. Their costs may be further reduced
using the solar energy or waste heat of power plant [98–99]. Integrated
NF–MED desalination processes are more effective energy saving pro-
cesses for fresh water production [100]. With NF pretreatment, its oper-
ating TBT may be increased from 65 °C to 125 °C without the danger of
scaling [86,88]. Turek et al. [101] evaluated the performance of three NF
membranes, NF200 and NF270, TFC-SR2 (Koch), in NF–RO–MED–
Crystallization (NF–RO–MED–Cr) desalination systems and found that
the retention coefficient of TFC-SR2 was the highest. The rejection
rates for hardness ions and Cl− for the optimized systems were 87.9%
and 23.7% at the pressure of 14 bar, respectively. Similar to other mem-
brane–thermal integrating systems, the NF in these integrated process-
es could enhance the recovery ratio and decrease the water production
costs of MED. The recovery and water production cost of the integrated
system were 78.2% and 0.5 $/m3, respectively.
4.3. Integrated NF and MD/MC desalination processes
Membrane distillation (MD) is attractive in seawater desalination
for its low cost, high rejection (100%, theoretical), low operating tem-
perature and pressure, and energy saving perspectives [102–106],
whose production cost of MD could be further reduced by using
solar energy and waste lower grade heat sources [107]. Drioli et al.
[108–109] used NF and membrane contactor units as pretreatment for
RO–MD desalination processes to form a hybrid NF–RO–MSF seawater
desalination system as shown in Fig. 3. NF unit helped solve the scaling
problem of MD by removing hardness ions [110]. The overall recovery of
the hybrid desalination system was 76.2%, the TDS of production water
was 310 ppm and the production cost was 0.92 $/m3.
Membrane crystallization (MC) combined the application of mem-
brane process with crystallization technology [111], producing freshwa-
ter as well as salt crystals from seawater desalination [112]. The
technology is very attractive in eliminating the environmental concern
from the discharge of harmful concentrated water from membrane
based desalination processes [113]. NF–RO–MC process is a very effi-
cient desalination technology, in which the NF stage removed about
90% of scaling ions and 27.6% of TDS when the recovery of the RO and
MC was 50% and 100%, respectively. Moreover, the quality of pure crys-
tals product was enhanced, and the cost of product water was less than
that of NF and RO [114–115].
 D. Zhou et al. / Desalination 376 (2015) 109–116
Fig. 3. Schematic diagram of hybrid NF–RO–MD seawater desalination process [109].
Drioli et al. [116–118] integrated the MF–NF–RO system with mem-
brane distillation/crystallization (MD/MC) units to achieve the high
water recovery rates of 92.8%. By using available waste thermal energy
and brine pressure exchanger system, the energy consumption of the
NF–RO–MC process (NF–RO and MC both on NF and RO retentate)
and NF–RO–MD/MC process (NF–RO, MC on NF retentate and MD on
RO retentate) were reduced to 1.54–1.61 kWh/m3 at the fresh water
production costs of about 0.51 $/m3. In consideration of the gain from
the salt sale (NaCl, Na2CO3, CaCO3, MgSO4·7H2O), the net fresh water
unit costs of the processes may be further lowered to negative numbers
of −0.71 $/m3 and −0.36 $/m3, respectively.
Integrating NF with thermal technologies is an effective strategy to
suppress reactor scaling of thermal based processes and enhance pro-
duction flux. The combinations of NF process also help to separate dif-
ferent valence of salt products. Salt producing amortized a part of
water product costs, which depended on the price of waste thermal
energy.
5. Integrated NF and ion exchange processes
Boron is harmful to the human body, and could not be effectively re-
moved by SWRO membrane process. IX (ion exchange) is an effective
method to remove ions [119], and had been applied in membrane sea-
water desalination for a long time, which is a very important technology
for effective removal of boron. Therefore, RO-IXR treatment is consid-
ered as a useful method to remove boron from permeates from RO sea-
water desalination systems [120–122]. Sarkar et al. [123–126] further
proposed the ion exchange–nanofiltration (HIX–NF) desalination pro-
cess as shown in Fig. 4. Firstly, polymeric ion exchange resins exchanged
the monovalent ions in seawater to divalent ions which could then be
effectively removed by NF processes. In the operation, NF could reject
more than 98% of the Na2SO4 under the overall energy consumption
Fig. 4. Schematic diagram of the HIX–NF desalination process with three major operation steps [125].
113
of 0.9 kWh/m3 and 50% reduction from RO processes. HIX–NF desalina-
tion process made a great advance in saving energy, but the costs and
working life of ion exchange resin are still limiting its applications.
6. Future perspectives
Integrating with NF was, and will be a key strategy to lower the costs
of current desalination systems. Some of the key performance factors of
the developed desalination processes using NF are summarized in
Table 2 for comparison.
In consideration of water quality and energy consumption, the dual-
stage NF seawater desalination process using high rejection NF was a
promising lower cost desalination technology for the future. Using
high cut off asymmetric polyimide based NF (such as NF90), and inte-
grating with ED process could improve the product water quality and
solve the boron problem in the systems.
As a mature technique, NF–RO process using NF270, K-SR2 and
NF99HF, showed significantly reduced water production costs and RO
membrane fouling. NF–SWRO plant could save product water costs by
30%. Additional research should be carried out to reduce NF membrane
fouling and further enhance its water flux under high ion rejection. In
consideration of the FO–NF–NF process, Na2SO4 was the most appropri-
ate draw solute. The HIX–NF system could save 50% power consumption
of that of RO and exhibit larger permeate flux. Additional research relat-
ing to FO–NF–NF and HIX–NF technology is needed in designing lower
cost high performance FO membranes and ion exchange resins.
Including NF pretreatment in thermal based desalination processes,
such as MSF and MED, could suppress thermal reactor scaling, enhance
thermal efficiency, increase product-water flux, and benefit salt separa-
tion in brine crystallization processes while combining NF with MD im-
proved both feed water quality and water recovery rate. In NF–RO–MD
desalination systems, overall water recovery may reach the high level of
114 D. Zhou et al. / Desalination 376 (2015) 109–116

Table 2
Key performance factors for seawater desalination processes.a, b, c, d

Processes Feed water Freshwater Permeate Recovery Rejection rates (TDS) Energy Production costs Reference
g/L flow quality rates consumption $/m3
(mg/L) % kWh/m3

NF–NF NF (NF90Dow) Seawater 37.5 30.6 L m−2 h−1 250 29.2 99.42 – – [35]
NF (NF90Dow) Seawater 35 – 254 33.3 99.27 3.35 – [38]
Seawater 43 – 359 21.9 99.16 4.2 –
NF (NF90Dow) Seawater 34.7 71 L m−2 h−1 260.9 2.8 99.25 2.54 – [39]
NF–RO NF RO (NF90 Seawater 35 – 67 47.9 99.81 3.25 – [38]
BW30Dow) Seawater 43 – 125 30.4 99.71 3.9 –
NF (DK GE) Seawater 43 130 m3 h−1 220 56 99.5 5.858 0.27 [47–48]
Seawater 35 517.6 m3 h−1 269.9 49.2 99.2 2.9 0.47 [116–117]
RO–NF RO (SW30 Dow) Seawater 35 0.38 m3 h−1 319.45 62.5 99.09 – 0.57 [55,57]
FO–NF FO (hydration) MgCl2 57.1 25.5 L m−2 h−1 17 – 99.97 – – [68]
NF (HL GE) MgSO4 120.3 4.9 L m−2 h−1 42 – 99.99 – –
Na2SO4 142 5.4 L m−2 h−1 12 – 99.97 – –
C6H12O6 180 11.9 L m−2 h−1 252 – 99.86 – –
NF–ED Seawater 3.5 – 218 – 99.4 0.245 (boron) 0.015 (boron) [77]
NF–RO–MSF Seawater 45.6 – 438.7 53.5 99.0 – – [89]
NF–MSF–Cr Seawater 3.5 – – – – – 0.71 [93]
NF–RO–MSF–Cr Seawater 3.5 – – 77.2 – – 0.37 [94]
NF–RO–MED–Cr Seawater 3.5 – – 78.2 – – 0.5 [101]
NF–RO–MD Seawater 48.4 76.2 m3 h−1 310 76.2 99.4 – 0.92 [109]
NF–RO–MCa Seawater 3.5 974.9 m3 h−1 143.3 92.8 99.59 1.54 0.51c [116–117]
−0.71d
NF–RO–MD/MCb Seawater 3.5 931.5 m3 h−1 150 88.7 99.57 1.61 0.51c [116–117]
−0.36d
HIX–NF NF (Dow) NaCl 0.32.7 3.85 L m−2 h−1 233 – 99.4 0.89 – [125]
a
Integration of the NF–RO desalination system with two MC stages operated both on the NF and RO retentates.
b
Integration of the NF–RO desalination system with a MC stage is operated on the NF retentate, while a MD stage is operated on the RO retentate.
c
The fresh water unit cost without considering the gain from the salt sale.
d
The fresh water unit cost considering the gain from the salt sale.

76.2% at the production cost of 0.92 $/m3. The water production cost of
NF–MSF–Cr and NF–RO–MSF–Cr systems was even lower at about 0.71–
0.43 $/m3, which may be further lowered to 0.37 $/m3 considering the
gain from salt sale. In consideration of the salt production income, the
freshwater costs of optimized NF–RO–MC and NF–RO–MD/MC process-
es may be negative, −0.71 $/m3 to −0.36 $/m3.
Including NF steps may increase the complexity and cost of desalina-
tion plant. Therefore, the cost, permeate quality, environmental impact
and special requirements of the NF membranes are critical for any suc-
cessful cost reduction. High cutoff NF membrane with high flux and
better antifouling properties should be further developed for lower
cost desalination applications.
Acknowledgment
The authors appreciate financial supports from the Ministry of
Science and Technology of China (No. 2014BAJ02B02), Bureau of
Science and Technology of Ningbo (No. 2014B81004, 2014B70023
and 2013C910012) and Ningbo Natural Science Foundation
(No. 2014A610137 and 2014A610138).
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