Impact of Phenol on Membranes during Bipolar Membrane Electrodialysis for High Salinity Pesticide Wastewater Treatment

Yuanhui Tang; Wenwen Sun; Yakai Lin; Lin Wang; Hedi Chen; Huanhuan Wu; Lixin Yu; Xiaolin Wang

doi:10.3390/separations9090241

Separations (Sep 2022)

Impact of Phenol on Membranes during Bipolar Membrane Electrodialysis for High Salinity Pesticide Wastewater Treatment

Yuanhui Tang,
Wenwen Sun,
Yakai Lin,
Lin Wang,
Hedi Chen,
Huanhuan Wu,
Lixin Yu,
Xiaolin Wang

Affiliations

Yuanhui Tang: College of Chemistry and Environmental Engineering, China University of Mining and Technology, Beijing 100083, China
Wenwen Sun: Beijing Key Laboratory of Membrane Materials and Engineering, State Key Laboratory of Chemical Engineering, Department of Chemical Engineering, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China
Yakai Lin: Beijing Key Laboratory of Membrane Materials and Engineering, State Key Laboratory of Chemical Engineering, Department of Chemical Engineering, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China
Lin Wang: Beijing Key Laboratory of Membrane Materials and Engineering, State Key Laboratory of Chemical Engineering, Department of Chemical Engineering, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China
Hedi Chen: College of Chemistry and Environmental Engineering, China University of Mining and Technology, Beijing 100083, China
Huanhuan Wu: Beijing Key Laboratory of Membrane Materials and Engineering, State Key Laboratory of Chemical Engineering, Department of Chemical Engineering, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China
Lixin Yu: Beijing Key Laboratory of Membrane Materials and Engineering, State Key Laboratory of Chemical Engineering, Department of Chemical Engineering, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China
Xiaolin Wang: Beijing Key Laboratory of Membrane Materials and Engineering, State Key Laboratory of Chemical Engineering, Department of Chemical Engineering, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China

DOI: https://doi.org/10.3390/separations9090241
Journal volume & issue: Vol. 9, no. 9
p. 241

Abstract

Read online

To achieve a cleaner production, pesticide wastewater with concentrated NaCl can be treated by using a bipolar membrane electrodialysis (BMED) and converted to NaOH and HCl, which minimizes acid and alkali consumption in a pesticide production process. However, ion-exchange membranes (IEMs) are vulnerable to fouling by phenolic substances present in the concentrated NaCl solutions. This work aimed to understand the performance and fouling mechanism of BMED from phenol during the desalination of NaCl and explore an effective cleaning method. The results firstly showed that for the NaCl solutions with higher phenol concentrations, the selectivity of the IEMs was reduced after processing six successive batches of BMED, which led to reverse migration of ions, organics leakage, and an obvious increase in the energy consumption and the concentration of generated acid and alkali. Secondly, IEMs characterization analysis detected that the structure of the IEMs was deformed, while phenol fouling deposits were observed on the surface and interior of the IEMs, especially for the anion exchange membranes (AEMs). Then, the results of soaking tests proved that the phenol could bring about swelling-like degradation to the AEMs and 0.1 wt.% NaOH solution was studied to be the optimized cleaning agent since the performance of the fouled IEMs in the short-running process could be recovered after 5 h of in situ cleaning that removed the phenol fouling deposits efficiently. Finally, the results of a long-running BMED operation treating NaCl solution containing 10 g/L phenol concentration showed that the IEMs were severely fouled, and the fouling was firstly due to the swelling-like mechanism during the initial 12 successive batches, and then should belong to the blockage-like mechanism during the following 20 successive batches. The seriously fouled IEMs could no longer be recovered even after a deep in situ cleaning. This research proves that under appropriate pretreatment or operating conditions, the BMED process is an alternative way of treating wastewater with high salinity and the presence of phenol molecules.

Published in Separations

ISSN: 2297-8739 (Online)
Publisher: MDPI AG
Country of publisher: Switzerland
LCC subjects: Science: Physics; Science: Chemistry
Website: http://www.mdpi.com/journal/separations

About the journal

Abstract

Keywords