Effect of salinity on membrane fouling

There is no direct impact of salinity on membrane performance since the membranes used in MBR have big enough pore sizes that can pass ions freely. However, salinity indirectly affects membrane performance by affecting floc formation in sludge. 1. Effect of variable salinity in short time frame The problems caused by varying salinity in a short time frame are tested with a pilot scale setup (Reid, 2006). When chloride (Cl-) concentration is raised up to 4.5 g/L using 30 g/L NaCl, membrane permeability dropped almost immediately as shown in Fig. 1 (note: seawater contains 19.4 g/L chloride). The recovery of flux does not occur immediately after the salinity went back to the original level. Although particle size appeared not changed, protein portions of SMP and EPS were significantly increased as summarized in Table 1.

Fig. 1. Permeability drop due to a salinity shock. HRT = 72 hr, SRT = 54 days, flux = 8 LMH (Reid, 2006). Table 1. Average fraction of SMP and EPS at low and high chloride level (Reid, 2006)

 2. Effect of lasting high salinity In general, floc formation is hampered by high salinity since the charges of particles are more effectively shielded by the counter ions so that charge induced flocculation can be largely inhibited. As shown in Fig. 2, mixed liquor from a MBR treating wastewater from a polymer synthesis process. Due to the high ionic strength measured by conductivity (62 mS/cm at 20oC vs 48 mS/cm for seawater at the same temperature), cells and debris hardly form floc. The flux of membranes in this application was no more than 5 LMH due to the severe membrane fouling by diffused mixed liquor. There is no known clear cut border from which conductivity impact membrane performance noticeably, but, if conductivity of wastewater is higher than 5-10 mS/cm (or salinity of 3.57.0 g/L as NaCl), deflocculation at high ionic strength can play a role in membrane fouling.

Fig. 2. Microscopic image of MBR mixed liquor with a conductivity of 62 mS/cm (x400). 3. Other effect of high salinity (Lay, 2010) Salinity influences the alpha factor indirectly by affecting the viscosity and the coalescence of air bubbles. When salinity increases from 0 g/L to 15 g/L, bubbles tend not to coalesce, which positively contribute to the alpha factor. However, the increased medium viscosity at high salinity negatively affect alpha factor. Salinity has direct impact on the oxygen solubility in the form of the factor beta. As shown in Eq. 2 and Eq 3 elsewhere, solubility of oxygen decreases as salinity increases. Fig. 3 illustrate the relation among DO, salinity, and water temperature. For example, beta is at 0.94 for TDS = 10 g/L and 0.92 for TDS = 15 g/L, but reduces to 0.74 for TDS = 50 g/L. Due to the complex relations among many environmental factors, the actual effect of salinity on oxygen dissolution can vary site by site. Studies show high salinity is detrimental to biological phosphorous removal. In one study phosphorus removal efficiency decreased from 84% to 22% when the salt content increased from 9 to 60 g/L. However, it is not clear whether the phosphorous removal efficiency can be recovered if the experiment was sustained for longer term and microbial community adapts to the high salinity. Nitrifiers can readily adapt to 30 g/L of salt, but they are inhibited at 40 g/L. However, as microbes often surprise us with their great adaptabilities, it might be possible to acclimate the nitrifiers, which are composed of diverse microorganisms, to a very high salinity, if enough acclimation time is given.

Fig. 3. Dissolved oxygen as functions of water temperature and salinity (Lay, 2010).