Prospects for improving the performance of SWRO plants by implementing advanced NF/RO techniques: Part-II

SWCC DTRI adopted a highly ambitious research program in which nanofiltration (NF) membranes operated on pretreated seawater to improve its scaling and fouling potential. NF membrane seawater pretreatment was introduced commercially at SWCC Umm Lujj SWRO plant, where NF and SWRO processes operated at 65% and 50% recovery, respectively, with an overall recovery of 32.5%. Therefore, this paper presents (Part-II) of this project, which deals with NF product as a superior RO feed with the main objective of increasing the water production at Umm Lujj NF/SWRO plant and improve its overall economics. In order to achieve the same, several approaches were adopted which includes long-term performance evaluation of NF membrane seawater pretreatment, SWRO and BWRO processes at recoveries of 90%, 52% and 92%, respectively. The results revealed that Umm Lujj NF/SWRO plant overall recovery can be increased from 32.5% to 44%.