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Frontiers of Environmental Science & Engineering

ISSN 2095-2201

ISSN 2095-221X(Online)

CN 10-1013/X

Postal Subscription Code 80-973

2018 Impact Factor: 3.883

Front. Environ. Sci. Eng.    2020, Vol. 14 Issue (2) : 32    https://doi.org/10.1007/s11783-019-1211-7
RESEARCH ARTICLE
Sea salt bittern-driven forward osmosis for nutrient recovery from black water: A dual waste-to-resource innovation via the osmotic membrane process
Wenchao Xue1(), May Zaw1, Xiaochan An2, Yunxia Hu2, Allan Sriratana Tabucanon3
1. Department of Energy, Environment and Climate Change, School of Environment, Resources and Development, Asian Institute of Technology, P.O. Box 4, Klong Luang, Pathumthani 12120, Thailand
2. State Key Laboratory of Separation Membranes and Membrane Processes, School of Materials Science and Engineering, Tianjin Polytechnic University, Tianjin 300387, China
3. Faculty of Environment and Resource Studies, Mahidol University, Nakhon Pathom 71370, Thailand
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Abstract

• A dual “waste-to-resource” application of FO was proposed.

• Performance of sea salt bittern as an economic FO draw solution was evaluated.

• High quality struvite recovery from black water using FO was demonstrated.

• Feed pH is a key factor to control the form of recovered phosphorous.

A dual “waste-to-resource” innovation in nutrient enrichment and recovery from domestic black water using a sea salt bittern (SSB)-driven forward osmosis (FO) process is proposed and demonstrated. The performance of SSB as a “waste-to-resource” draw solution for FO was first evaluated. A synthetic SSB-driven FO provided a water flux of 25.67±3.36 L/m2⋅h, which was 1.5‒1.7 times compared with synthetic seawater, 1 M NaCl, and 1 M MgCl2. Slightly compromised performance regarding reverse solute selectivity was observed. In compensation, the enhanced reverse diffusion of Mg2+ suggested superior potential in terms of recovering nutrients in the form of struvite precipitation. The nutrient enrichment was performed using both the pre-filtered influent and effluent of a domestic septic tank. Over 80% of phosphate-P recovery was achieved from both low- and high-strength black water at a feed volume reduction up to 80%‒90%. With an elevated feed pH (~9), approximately 60%‒85% enriched phosphate-P was able to be recovered in the form of precipitated stuvite. Whereas the enrichment performance of total Kjeldahl nitrogen (TKN) largely differed depending on the strength of black water. Improved concentration factor (i.e., 3-folds) and retention (>60%) of TKN was obtained in the high-nutrient-strength black water at a feed volume reduction of 80%, in comparison with a weak TKN enrichment observed in low-strength black water. The results suggested a good potential for nutrient recovery based on this dual “waste-to-resource” FO system with proper management of membrane cleaning.

Keywords Forward osmosis      Sea salt bittern      Black water      Nutrient recovery      pH     
Corresponding Author(s): Wenchao Xue   
Issue Date: 15 January 2020
 Cite this article:   
Wenchao Xue,May Zaw,Xiaochan An, et al. Sea salt bittern-driven forward osmosis for nutrient recovery from black water: A dual waste-to-resource innovation via the osmotic membrane process[J]. Front. Environ. Sci. Eng., 2020, 14(2): 32.
 URL:  
https://academic.hep.com.cn/fese/EN/10.1007/s11783-019-1211-7
https://academic.hep.com.cn/fese/EN/Y2020/V14/I2/32
Parameter Feed solution
Low strength black water High strength black water
pH 7.26±0.90 7.77±0.09
EC (mS/cm) 0.81±0.45 1.27±0.58
TOC (mg/L) 63.09±33.88 174.48±17.81
TKN (mg/L) 72.52±54.44 200.67±141.62
NH3-N (mg/L) 37.52±34.89 109.67±33.08
Phosphate-P (mg/L) 8.63±0.99 14.04±3.91
Mg2+ concentration (mg/L) 92.66±4.61 94.82±12.35
Parameter Draw solution
Synthetic sea salt bittern Synthetic sea water
pH 5.76±0.35 6.33±0.16
EC (mS/cm) 171.64±5.73 77.18±1.12
NaCl (g/L) 179.74±0.18 27.25±0.22
MgCl2 (g/L) 202.94±0.09 57.18±0.37
MgSO4 (g/L) 123.58±0.06 6.06±0.11
NaBr (g/L) 2.51±0.12 ?
CaSO4 (g/L) 0.616±0.01 11.33±0.14
KCl (g/L) 21.02±0.28 1.41±0.22
Tab.1  Chemical compositions of feed solution (black water) and draw solution (synthetic SSB and synthetic seawater)
Draw solution composition FO water flux, Jw (L/m2·h) Reverse salt diffusion flux, JDS Membrane reverse solute selectivity
NaCl flux or equivalent (mmol/ m2·h) MgCl2 flux or equivalent (mmol/ m2·h) NaCl or equivalent (m3/mol) MgCl2 or equivalent (m3/mol)
Synthetic SSB (n = 3) 25.67±3.36 15.08±1.48 21.12±2.07 1.66 1.18
Synthetic sea water (n = 3) 15.40±1.10 4.13±0.42 5.76±0.61 3.72 2.67
1 mol/L NaCl (n = 3) 17.57±1.07 3.88±0.42 n.a. 4.52 n.a.
1 mol/L MgCl2 (n = 3) 15.30±3.08 n.a. 10.27±1.23 n.a. 1.49
Tab.2  Performance of synthetic sea salt bittern in comparison with several classic compositions of FO draw solution
Fig.1  Mg2+ accumulation in feed solution of FO with different draw solutions.
Fig.2  TKN, phosphate-P, ammonium-N, and TOC enrichment performance by synthetic SSB-driven FO.
Fig.3  Recovered nutrient observation using SEM-EDS for (A) low-strength black water and (B) high-strength black water.
Fig.4  TKN and phosphate-P mass balance in FO system. (A) Low-strength black water as feed solution, FO enrichment was conducted until feed volume reduction of 90% and 80%, respectively, with end pH at 8.7; (B) high-strength black water as feed solution, FO enrichment was conducted until feed volume reduction of 80% with end pH at 7.6; and (C) high-strength black water as feed solution, FO enrichment was conducted until feed volume reduction of 80% with end pH adjusted to 9.3.
Fig.5  Water flux loss due to membrane fouling by low-strength black water and high-strength black water.
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