Unit II

MEMBRANE FOULING
Membrane Fouling
 Irreversible deposition of retained particles, colloids, macromolecules,
salts, etc., at the membrane surface or inside the membrane at the
pore wall, which causes a continuous flux decline
Membrane fouling
 Fouling occurs mainly in case of porous membrane like microfiltration
and ultrafiltration.

In case of microfiltration, the flux decline can reach values more than
90% of the pure water flux.

 In pervaporation and gas separation involving dense membranes,

fouling is virtually absent although concentration polarization is absent.

 The type of separation process and the type of membrane used

determine the extent of fouling.

 Roughly three type of foulant can be distinguished:

a) organic precipitates (macromolecules, biological substances)
b) inorganic precipitates (metal hydroxides, calcium salts)
c) particulates
Membrane fouling
 Phenomenon of fouling is very specific for a given application and is
difficult to describe theoretically.

 For a given feed, fouling will depend on the physical and chemical
parameters of the feed such as concentration, temperature, pH, ionic
strength etc,.

 No general theory or model for fouling as fouling varies from case to

case basis.

 Most simple model that give a reasonable description of fouling are

typically semi empirical.

J = Jo tn, n<0

where J = actual flux

Jo = initial flux
t = time
Membrane fouling
 As there is no general theory for fouling, methods to reduce fouling
varies from case to case.

 However, reliable values of flux decline are necessary for process

design. These values are obtained from pilot – plant studies or simple
experiments.

 Many parameters are derived from fouling tests to describe the fouling
rate by suspended or colloidal dissolved particles

- Silting index (SI)

- Plugging index (PI)
- Fouling index (FI) or Slit density index (SDI)
- Modified fouling index or membrane filtration index
(MFI)
Membrane fouling

 Disadvantage of the fouling tests is that they are based on dead end
filtration, where as commercial applications involve cross flow
separation.
Membrane fouling
SILT DENSITY INDEX (SDI):

SDI is determined with a microfiltration membrane with diameter of 47 mm

and a pore size of 0.45 μm.

Feed is pressurized to 210 kPa and then the time is measured to collect
500 ml of permeate (Δt1).

Then, 15 minutes after the start of the experiment again the time is
measured (Δt1) to collect 500 ml permeate.

SDI is calculated as:

SDI is commonly used parameter to determine the quality of feed in reverse

osmosis parameters
Membrane fouling
PLUGGING INDEX (PI):

PI is extension form of SDI which express the plugging with a percentage,

where 100% means the filter is completely plugged

Here the measurement time (Δt2) is variable. The plugging index is defined
as follows:
Membrane fouling
SILTING INDEX(SI):

SI is based on cake or gel filtration. Silting index is defined as

V1 and V2 are selected in a way that the second term becomes unity, so
that we have SI as
Membrane fouling
MEMBRANE FILTRATION INDEX (MFI):

Flux through the membrane can be described as

Rc is cake resistance and is independent of the applied pressure. When

the thickness of the cake is lc, the resistance of the cake is given by

Where rc is specific cake resistance

Membrane fouling
MEMBRANE FILTRATION INDEX (MFI):

For 100 % rejection, RC can be obtained from a mass balance as

Now the flux may be written as

Integrating the above equation with condition, that at t=0, V = 0, we get

the relationship as
Membrane fouling
MEMBRANE FILTRATION INDEX (MFI):

The plot of (t/V) as a function of V gives a straight line after an initial

section. The slope of this line is defined as MFI.

MFI is based on cake filtration model and agrees with many experimental
scenarios as a first scale approximation
Membrane fouling
MEMBRANE FILTRATION INDEX (MFI):

Use of MFI have some advantages

- Flux decline can be predicted to some extent
- a maximum allowable MFI value can be given for a specific plant
- MFI agrees mostly with many experimental values for MF & UF.
Membrane fouling
MEMBRANE FILTRATION INDEX (MFI):

Disadvantages associated with MFI

- MFI is based on dead end experiments
- Cake resistance is assumed to be independent of pressure which
is not the case in general.
- MFI is based on cake filtration model where as there are other
factors which also contribute for membrane fouling