Water Resources and Industry最新文献

For decades, “Which treatment process is the best?” has been the primary question for many researchers worldwide. Therefore, this study aims to optimize the treatment models using the Imperialist Competitive Algorithm (ICA) to achieve a techno-economical comparison of biological, adsorption, electrocoagulation (EC), and bio-adsorption processes as examples in Acid Orange 7 (AO 7) and Acid Red 18 (AR 18) removal. Membrane Sequencing Batch Reactor (MSBR), Granular Activated Carbon (GAC), and GAC-MSBR were selected as biological, adsorbent, and biological-adsorption processes, respectively. MSBR was the cheapest (0.02–0.08 US$/m³) followed by GAC (0.03–0.63 US$/m³). Although MSBR permeates may not be of desirable quality, GAC and GAC-MSBR permeate offer the best quality. In addition to high operating costs in EC (≥1 US$/m³), the electrodes should be changed after several usages, which cost approximately 550 US$/m³. In this research, GAC-MSBR, as an effective process, had 80–100% AR 18 removal efficiency (0.14–0.16 US$/m³).

Municipal reclaimed water is increasingly being considered as a sustainable source of makeup water for cooling towers. However, many oil and gas facilities in the water scarce middle eastern regions still depend on non-renewable groundwater for operating cooling towers. Successful application of reclaimed water in a dry desert climate with very high temperature requires a critical understanding of several factors, including water efficiency, biohazards, equipment reliability, and economics. In particular, biohazard assessment, due to bacteria and virus contamination in hot weather, should be assessed to understand the human risks of utilizing reclaimed water. This study investigated the applicability of municipal reclaimed water as an alternative to groundwater for an industrial cooling system at an oil and gas facility in Saudi Arabia. Treated wastewater effluent from an activated sludge biological treatment process was utilized, as make up water for a 4.2 MW cooling tower. The results of this study showed that water efficiency can be increased using municipal reclaimed water instead of groundwater by increasing the cycle of concentration. The bacterial and enteric virus study indicated that the disinfection and biocide treatment was effective in controlling biological growth and minimizing associated risks to human health. The use of reclaimed water was economically viable with 27% reduction in water consumption.

Dyes are pollutants widely used in several industries that end up dumped as wastewater, contributing to water pollution. In the scope of improving water quality, liquid-liquid extraction is a separation technique widely used to remove pollutants from water, due to the possibility of recovering all the involved agents. In this work, deep eutectic solvents (DESs) based on mixtures of thymol with menthol, coumarin, octanoic acid and decanoic acid were applied as extraction agents to remove congo red from water. Among all the studied solvents, those formed by thymol with organic acids showed extraction efficiencies higher than 90% for low initial concentrations of congo red, using 1/5 (v/v) DES/water proportion and 1 h of stirring time as extraction parameters. The best results were achieved using Thymol:Octanoic acid (1:1) solvent. Furthermore, at the end of the process each reagent can be reused. DES reusability was checked for three extraction cycles, keeping stable.

Textile industry is one of the major water-consuming sectors; therefore, developing methods for reusing water is essential. Processes including reverse osmosis (RO) have gained momentum recently and been widely used. However, concentrated streams (brine) generated from RO must be managed properly. In this study, a pilot-scale brine treatment system containing ozone oxidation, nanofiltration (NF), RO and ion exchange (IEX) was developed and operated to recover a high quality process water and salt solution to be reused in dyeing processes. It was revealed that 77% of the water and 66% of the salt solution (as NaCl) can be recovered and brine discharge can be reduced. With full-scale operation for one year, it is possible to achieve cost-savings by 176,256 USD with 115,000 m³ reused water and by 37,000 USD with 680 tons of recovered NaCl. Recovery of brine makes it possible to achieve sustainable production and zero liquid discharge concepts.

Silica scaling is one of the major scaling challenges in Reverse Osmosis (RO). The safe operation practice is to keep the silica concentration below 150 mg/L in RO concentrate. This study addresses the effects of divalent cations such as calcium and magnesium on silica scaling in a seawater RO installation used as a pretreatment to Eutectic Freeze Crystallisation (EFC). Results showed that in the absence of antiscalant and divalent cations a sustained silica concentration of approximately 280 mg/L in concentrate is possible without declining membrane permeability. At a higher concentration of divalent cations, the membrane permeability decreased. Membrane autopsy and analysing destructed membrane showed a relatively low magnesium and a high calcium concentration on the membrane after adding divalent ions into the solutions. It is concluded that in absence of divalent cations and without antiscalant the limits of 150 mg/L silica can be extended to 280 mg/L for 6–8 h.

Natural mineral water should be characterized by chemical and microbiological purity as well as constant mineral composition. Mineral water exploitation may cause changes in their chemical composition, adversely affecting their chemical properties.

This article proposes a methodology for testing the variability of selected chemical parameters of mineral waters as a factor that enables managing, and consequently preventing, aquifers from deteriorating due to excessive exploitation. To control the operation of the water extraction process, the modified cumulative sum chart (CUSUM chart) was proposed. On the basis of the card, indicating the relationship between the amount of extraction and the carbon dioxide concentration in mineral waters, the relationships between these parameters were determined. These factors may allow the control of the volume of extraction to maintain an appropriate chemical composition of the exploited water. The obtained results confirm the literature mentions the unfavourable influence of excessive water exploitation on their chemical composition.

Poland has significant geothermal water resources and the study presents a list of 29 undeveloped but existing intakes of ready-thermal waters with temperatures ranging from 21 to 86 °C. In this study, important issues related to the hitherto unused intakes of geothermal waters will be discussed in a comprehensive manner: a review has been made with regard to the location of geothermal water resources in Poland, where there are already wells, but not yet exploited – list of all undeveloped geothermal water intakes. Estimated calculations were made for 29 wells, of Thermal Power [MW] and Thermal Energy [GWh/year] and estimated Exergy [kJ/kg] analysis for selected intakes. In the context of air protection, calculations were made related to the estimated reduction of harmful air pollutants, if the geothermal intakes presented in the article were to be used. Presents the results for coagulation for water from a selected geothermal water intake, from which it was possible to remove the total iron content from the water with high efficiency. This is the proposed method of treating geothermal water, supported by the results of the researcher's own research. The thermal energy that these sources can generate amounts to a total of approximately 247.5 [GWh/year]. Moreover, this energy would allow to heat about 8250 single-family houses, covering a total area of 350,000 square meters. The problem of geothermal water quality was discussed and the results were presented after it had been subjected to the coagulation process. Coagulation has been proposed as an effective method to remove undesirable compounds from geothermal water before it enters the installation. A satisfactory total iron removal effect at the level of 99% was obtained thanks to the use of highly polymerized aluminum coagulants in combination with filtration.

The Port of Rotterdam is a heavily man-modified estuarine system, Europe's major seaport and home to a large number of chemical and petrochemical plants, many of which are supplied with distilled water from two demineralized water plants in Botlek and Maasvlakte. In this study, we assessed the ecological conditions near the brine outfalls and at a reference site unimpacted by brine, focusing on the benthic macrofaunal composition. Overall, the analysis of the communities and species revealed a similar macrobenthic composition, although with lower abundance and diversity compared to the nearby North Sea environment. The outfall area of the Botlek demineralized water plant, which is a dead-end entirely marine waterway with no to little currents in contrast to the well flushed brackish environment of the outfall of the Maasvlakte demineralized water plant, was characterized by the lowest abundance of benthic macroinvertebrates, species richness and Shannon diversity index. Higher biodiversity values at the Maasvlakte demineralized water plant compared to the reference site were also associated with the presence of a large biogenic reef of the Pacific oyster Crassostrea gigas with specimens of over 8 years estimated age being observed, however with many dead individuals recorded at the time of surveys. The outfall area of the Botlek demineralized water plant also had the highest disturbance levels according to the results of AZTI's Marine Biotic Index (AMBI) in conjunction with Benthos Ecosystem Quality Index (BEQI). Its community was dominated by the opportunistic native species Capitella capitata and Varicorbula gibba, and species typical for organic matter enrichment such as Alitta succinea (native), Streblospio cf shrubsolii (native) and Theora lubrica (invasive), which correlates well with higher levels of anthropogenic pollution in this area. Generalized linear model (GLM) and distance-based multivariate linear model (DistLM) showed that the distance from the outfalls was an important factor in terms of brine impacts however explaining a small part of the variation observed. Similarity percentage analysis (SIMPER), multivariate analysis, and permutational multivariate analysis (PERMANOVA) showed low similarity between and within study sites, confirming that high levels of heterogeneity exist within the estuarine system in terms of natural conditions and anthropogenic stress.