Evaluation of ceramic membrane applications for water treatment plants with a life cycle cost analysis

Abstract

Ceramic membranes have many advantages such as durability, chemical resistance, high flux, and long life span. However, they generally require relatively high initial investment cost compared to polymeric membranes when they are used for a water treatment process. Therefore, if ceramic membranes are considered to be applied to a water treatment plant (WTP), the life cycle cost (LCC) analysis should be performed to evaluate its economic feasibility. In this study, the capital and operational expense data of selected WTPs which have membrane filtration processes were used for their LCC analysis. Production capacity of the plants, membrane flux and life span, and costs of membrane modules and electricity were considered as key analysis factors. From the LCC analyses with various conditions including membrane costs and membrane flux, the correlation of the key design parameters was obtained that can make the ceramic membrane filtration more cost-effective compared to the polymeric membrane method. At present state, WTP with a ceramic membrane should increase the permeate flux to meet the economic feasibility, but it is expected to have a bright future because of the recent development of manufacturing technologies and increase of demand in many industries.

Keywords:

• Treatment
• Ceramic membrane
• Life cycle cost (LCC)
• Water treatment plant design

Acknowledgments

This research was supported by the project titled “A design guideline for water treatment system using ceramic membrane” funded by GS Engineering & Construction Corporation and Basic Science Research Program through the National Research Foundation of Korea funded by the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology (Grant No. 2011-0014006).

Notes

Presented at the 6th International Conference on the “Challenges in Environmental Science and Engineering” (CESE-2013), 29 October–2 November 2013, Daegu, Korea