Effect of different operation pressures for various membranes on the performance of RO plants Original Research Article

The aim was to study the effect of different operation pressures on the performance of reverse osmosis (RO) plants for various types of membranes. The study was conducted in a pilot plant at the University of Basrah, College of Engineering, which has a capacity of 9 m3/h. The plant is comprised of two parallel vessels containing five elements for each vessel, 8″ in diameter and 40″ in length. The first vessel has Saehane membranes, type RE8040BE-400 ft2 manufactured in South Korea. Koch membranes, type 8822-XR-365 ft2 made in the US, were used in the second vessel. The pilot plant uses brackish water from the Tigris River with TDS <600 ppm. The new type of RO membranes (Saehane) were used for the first trial for production of desalted water from brackish water less than 600 ppm and the results were compared with performance of the Koch membranes. It was found that over 180 days of continuous operation, the amount of permeate for Saehane membranes is larger than Koch membranes by about 26%. It was also observed that the quality of permeate water stream for Koch membranes is less than for the Saehane membranes by about 11%.