Performance and resilience of the PolyCera® Titan membrane for industrial wastewater treatment

Abstract

AbstractThis research aims to evaluate the performance of PolyCera® Titan membrane for different wastewater treatment. Membrane filtration of several cycles was conducted in understanding the fouling mechanism, fouling propensity, and defouling potential of the PolyCera® Titan which had not been studied by any other researcher before. The PolyCera® Titan membrane is effective for the treatment of textile industry wastewater, palm oil mill effluent (POME), leachate, and semiconductor-industry wastewater. Rejection of methylene blue (MB) and Congo red (CR) was in the range of 78.76–86.04% and 88.89–93.71%, respectively; 94.72–96.50% NaCl, 96.07–97.62% kaolin, and 97.26–97.73% glucose were rejected from synthetic leachate indicating the removal of TDS, TSS, and COD from the leachate, respectively. Standard blocking and complete model were the best models used to explain the PolyCera® Titan membrane fouling mechanism in all types of wastewater treatment processes with a high R2 value. Physical cleaning with the use of distilled water was able to recover the permeate flux with the flux recovery ratio (FRR) value in the range of 79.2–95.22% in the first cycle, 81.20–98.16% in the second cycle, and 86.09–95.96% in the third cycle.