Periodic Reporting for period 1 - MEloDIZER (SUSTAINABLE MEMBRANE DISTILLATION FOR INDUSTRIAL WATER REUSE AND DECENTRALISED DESALINATION APPROACHING ZERO WASTE)
Reporting period: 2022-12-01 to 2024-05-31
MEloDIZER's overarching goal is to provide the needed step to transform membrane distillation (MD) and especially its core components, namely, membranes and membrane modules, into products for the benefit of industry and society.
Two strategic objectives within the EU and worldwide addressed in the MEloDIZER project are achieving sustainable water management and assuring reliable and unhindered access to critical raw materials. MD is a key technology to achieve these goals. MD will be successful when applied to manage suitable waste streams, each at the correct scale and combined with the appropriate mix of renewable energy sources. MEloDIZER will thus deliver improved membranes and modules and will demonstrate their rational use for implementations that have been identified by this Consortium as having strategic and high winning potential.
Key challenges will be overcome, as outlined below:
(1) Creation of next-generation membranes and modules. Expected results are high-performance and robust membranes, obtained with green materials and adopting sustainable approaches, packed within energy-efficient modules made by biodegradable polymers that can be easily disassembled and recycled.
(2) Rationally integrate the core innovative membrane and module components with energy and control systems that maximise their performance and enable the smart utilisation of two renewable energy sources: (i) waste heat and (ii) solar power.
(3) Demonstrate the performance of the next-gen membrane components in systems aimed at the reduction of industrial waste streams, the reuse of water, the extraction of resources, and for the production of drinking water by decentralised and diffuse human-scale MD units.
(4) Demonstrate the economic and environmental benefits associated with the implementation of the innovative membrane components and the resulting improved MD technology, also providing sustainable end-of-life management of membranes components and systems.
Two strategic objectives within the EU and worldwide addressed in the MEloDIZER project are achieving sustainable water management and assuring reliable and unhindered access to critical raw materials. MD is a key technology to achieve these goals. MD will be successful when applied to manage suitable waste streams, each at the correct scale and combined with the appropriate mix of renewable energy sources. MEloDIZER will thus deliver improved membranes and modules and will demonstrate their rational use for implementations that have been identified by this Consortium as having strategic and high winning potential.
Key challenges will be overcome, as outlined below:
(1) Creation of next-generation membranes and modules. Expected results are high-performance and robust membranes, obtained with green materials and adopting sustainable approaches, packed within energy-efficient modules made by biodegradable polymers that can be easily disassembled and recycled.
(2) Rationally integrate the core innovative membrane and module components with energy and control systems that maximise their performance and enable the smart utilisation of two renewable energy sources: (i) waste heat and (ii) solar power.
(3) Demonstrate the performance of the next-gen membrane components in systems aimed at the reduction of industrial waste streams, the reuse of water, the extraction of resources, and for the production of drinking water by decentralised and diffuse human-scale MD units.
(4) Demonstrate the economic and environmental benefits associated with the implementation of the innovative membrane components and the resulting improved MD technology, also providing sustainable end-of-life management of membranes components and systems.
MD MARKET OPPORTUNITIES AND BARRIERS
Initial activities set out to identify and examine the potential markets for MD, and to provide qualitative insights to the consortium on the current technology landscape. The main drivers identified for the adoption of MD technologies are the following:
• Primarily, economic drivers behind brine-mining and resource recovery. MD also has the ability to concentrate brine to almost its saturation point.
• Regulators worldwide are pushing for increased water reuse, improved resource recovery, reduced brine discharge, and stricter discharge quality standards.
• Environmentally and in line with the goals of many global corporate water stewardship programmes, the use of MD to improve process water efficiency can significantly reduce freshwater demand.
• Lithium extraction and acid recovery are the two markets that showed the most promising potential for wastewater mining applications of MD.
Barriers to the adoption of MD innovations include fierce market competition, lack of commercial track record, scalability concerns and energy requirement. While the former two barriers are market-driven, it is important for MD technologies to address the concerns around scalability and energy requirement or target markets where these concerns are deemed insignificant or irrelevant.
To address these technical issues, innovation activities have been performed to develop novel sustainable membranes, to optimize the MD system via multi-scale models, and to integrate the membrane and module components in high-performance MD demonstrators supplied with renewable energy.
SUSTAINABLE MEMBRANES
The core technical research of the first reporting period focused on producing membranes with high hydrophobicity, chemical resistance, and long life, for use in membrane distillation. PVDF-based membranes were prepared using two non-toxic solvents. The membranes were also surface-functionalised in order to improve their performance. A series of recipes were explored, and the most promising ones were identified to produce membranes in two configurations, i.e. flat-sheet and hollow fibre, which can be used at a large scale and can be manufactured sustainably, replacing the current potentially harmful materials with non-harmful ones and following the principles of green chemistry. The membranes were challenged against both synthetic and real wastewaters from demo sites. The tests allowed identification of both membrane potential and critical issues when treating complex wastewaters. Recommendations were thus made to further optimize the membrane properties, to produce the modules, and to design effective MD system.
SYSTEM OPTIMISATON AND DESIGN
A series of modeling tools were developed and adopted to understand and optimize membrane, module, and system performance at different scales. Specifically, the models developed and validated so far allow understanding of membrane properties/performance relationship, improvement of fluid dynamics conditions in the module channels, optimisation of geometry and module configuration, selection of energy devices and system configuration. Based on both the modeling work and the knowledge gained from membrane preparation, preliminary designs of the four prototypes were drafted according to the identified boundary conditions at the selected demo sites, which will be refined and finalised in the second reporting period.
Initial activities set out to identify and examine the potential markets for MD, and to provide qualitative insights to the consortium on the current technology landscape. The main drivers identified for the adoption of MD technologies are the following:
• Primarily, economic drivers behind brine-mining and resource recovery. MD also has the ability to concentrate brine to almost its saturation point.
• Regulators worldwide are pushing for increased water reuse, improved resource recovery, reduced brine discharge, and stricter discharge quality standards.
• Environmentally and in line with the goals of many global corporate water stewardship programmes, the use of MD to improve process water efficiency can significantly reduce freshwater demand.
• Lithium extraction and acid recovery are the two markets that showed the most promising potential for wastewater mining applications of MD.
Barriers to the adoption of MD innovations include fierce market competition, lack of commercial track record, scalability concerns and energy requirement. While the former two barriers are market-driven, it is important for MD technologies to address the concerns around scalability and energy requirement or target markets where these concerns are deemed insignificant or irrelevant.
To address these technical issues, innovation activities have been performed to develop novel sustainable membranes, to optimize the MD system via multi-scale models, and to integrate the membrane and module components in high-performance MD demonstrators supplied with renewable energy.
SUSTAINABLE MEMBRANES
The core technical research of the first reporting period focused on producing membranes with high hydrophobicity, chemical resistance, and long life, for use in membrane distillation. PVDF-based membranes were prepared using two non-toxic solvents. The membranes were also surface-functionalised in order to improve their performance. A series of recipes were explored, and the most promising ones were identified to produce membranes in two configurations, i.e. flat-sheet and hollow fibre, which can be used at a large scale and can be manufactured sustainably, replacing the current potentially harmful materials with non-harmful ones and following the principles of green chemistry. The membranes were challenged against both synthetic and real wastewaters from demo sites. The tests allowed identification of both membrane potential and critical issues when treating complex wastewaters. Recommendations were thus made to further optimize the membrane properties, to produce the modules, and to design effective MD system.
SYSTEM OPTIMISATON AND DESIGN
A series of modeling tools were developed and adopted to understand and optimize membrane, module, and system performance at different scales. Specifically, the models developed and validated so far allow understanding of membrane properties/performance relationship, improvement of fluid dynamics conditions in the module channels, optimisation of geometry and module configuration, selection of energy devices and system configuration. Based on both the modeling work and the knowledge gained from membrane preparation, preliminary designs of the four prototypes were drafted according to the identified boundary conditions at the selected demo sites, which will be refined and finalised in the second reporting period.
• New recipes for membrane fabrication deploying non-toxic solvents: more sustainable and safer membrane manufacturing industry, as well as polymer/plastic sector. Further research needed for additional tweaking and customisation, and to minimise waste and energy input during fabrication.
• More sustainable membranes in two configurations achieved, namely, flat-sheet and hollow fibres: potential utilisation in a large variety of diverse sectors exploiting membrane-based separation techniques, e.g. water/wastewater treatment, food and beverage industry, water-intensive energy industry, pharmaceutical industry. Upscaling of the membranes is currently needed, followed by demonstration and commercialisation.
• New, robust models for membrane distillation and for membrane, module, and system optimization: potential impacts on membrane industry in general, with indirect impacts on all the sectors listed above. Further sensitivity analyses are currently ongoing, to provide general design guidelines for optimal MD systems in the MEloDIZER's project and beyond.
• Identification of most suitable (as well as unsuitable) water/wastewater streams for filtration using membrane distillation: toward understanding of the real benefits and limitations of MD and, most importantly, of the technically and potentially economically feasible applications of this technique.
• More sustainable membranes in two configurations achieved, namely, flat-sheet and hollow fibres: potential utilisation in a large variety of diverse sectors exploiting membrane-based separation techniques, e.g. water/wastewater treatment, food and beverage industry, water-intensive energy industry, pharmaceutical industry. Upscaling of the membranes is currently needed, followed by demonstration and commercialisation.
• New, robust models for membrane distillation and for membrane, module, and system optimization: potential impacts on membrane industry in general, with indirect impacts on all the sectors listed above. Further sensitivity analyses are currently ongoing, to provide general design guidelines for optimal MD systems in the MEloDIZER's project and beyond.
• Identification of most suitable (as well as unsuitable) water/wastewater streams for filtration using membrane distillation: toward understanding of the real benefits and limitations of MD and, most importantly, of the technically and potentially economically feasible applications of this technique.