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The addition of a coagulant as a pretreatment before membranefiltration is becoming a common practice among utilities.However, little is known about the effects of coagulation pretreatmenton membrane filtration performance.The objective of this study was toimprove the understanding of the effects of coagulants on membraneperformance. The primary variables used in the studyincluded source water, type of coagulant, coagulant dose, coagulationapplication conditions, and membrane material. Fouling wasevaluated using flat-sheet membranes in an unstirred filtrationcell. Prefiltration was used to separate the effect of coagulationon particulate matter and dissolved organic carbon. To providemore widespread applicability, five natural surface waters andthree membrane materials were included.The research found that coagulant dose was an important factorin determining whether performance was better or worse. A positivelinear relationship was found between the ability of coagulation toremove dissolved organic carbon and to improve membrane performance.No single coagulant was consistently better than the others;rather, whichever coagulant tended to be most effective at removingdissolved organic carbon in a particular source was also most effectiveat improving membrane performance. Includes 31 references, tables, figures.

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Edition: Vol. 98 - No. 4 Published: 04/01/2006 Number of Pages: 14 File Size: 1 file , 960 KB