engleski

Removal of emerging contaminants of industrial origin by NF/RO – a pilot scale study

Emerging contaminants are organic compounds such as human and veterinary pharmaceuticals, personal care products, surfactants and surfactant residues, plasticizers, different industrial additives, dyes, etc. that, owing to the progress in analytical methods, can be recently found in ppb concentrations in surface and waste waters. These unregulated contaminants may be candidates for future regulation, depending on research on their potential health effects and monitoring data regarding their occurrence. The extensive research is focused on antibiotics since their emissions can increase the occurrence of resistant bacteria in the environment. Efficient NF/RO treatment of wastewaters prior to their discharge are the key issue for to the quality of water supplies. In this study a small NF/RO pilot plant built for a typical wastewater treatment using membrane technology was tested and membranes’ removal potential for emerging contaminants from a plant producing veterinary pharmaceuticals was investigated. Wastewater stream of the plant, containing residuals of antibiotics and other organics was treated by three different types of NF/RO membranes. The performance results show the complete removal of all the antibiotics by the RO membrane and by the tight nanofiltration membrane NF90. Only the loose nanofiltration membrane element HL incompletely rejected the smaller sulfonamide antibiotics.

emerging contaminats; waste water; RO/NF membrane treatment

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