Membrane Technology for Treatment of Pharmaceutical Wastewaters

Abstract

It is estimated 90% of the available water resources will be expended in 15 years and by 2025, nearly 60% of the world population will have scarcity of water if the rate of consumption continues at its present level. The mounting use of pharmaceuticals, with enhanced production, have driven these industrial effluents into so-called emerging pollutants that have become a new environmental problem. Pharmaceutical wastewater, specifically categorized by complex components, are ending up polluting natural water bodies, making it necessary to remove such substances from the wastewaters to prevent harm to the natural environment. Amid options available for treating these effluents, biological processes are cost-effective and environmentally safe alternatives to chemical methods. One of the recent advances includes use of membrane technology. Among these, membrane bioreactor and reverse osmosis technologies are becoming advanced and promising options for wastewater treatment, and reuse at a reduced price is making it economically feasible.

Biological Treatability of Low Total Dissolved Solids (LTDS) Using SBR as a Pre-Treatment for Reverse Osmosis

“…Indian pharmaceutical industry is ranked third-largest in the world with reference to volume and is at 14 th position with reference to value. Experiencing 8 to 9 per cent annual growth rate, it is predicted to have 4.5 billion dollars' worth [3] [4] [5]. The pharmaceutical industry encompasses the manufacturing of biological products, botanical products, medicinal chemicals and pharmaceutical products.…”

A proposed Fuzzy logic model for Electrospun nanofiber pressurised membranes for water treatment- A review

“…Nanofiltration and ultrafiltration are widely used pressure-driven techniques consisting of hallo and sheet-like nanofibers. Many researchers have much-researched cellulose acetate and polymeric materials and their combinations (Konni et al, 2022;Vara et al, 2020). Electrolysis and reversal electrodialysis techniques utilize DC currents bypassing the ions via membranes with oppositely charged materials and found that the ions' rate of flow and concentrations is a deciding factor for filtration efficiencies.…”

“…These techniques are classified based on particle removal into reverse osmosis, membrane filtration, membrane reactor, gas separation, nanofiltration, ultrafiltration, membrane distillation etc. (Vara et al, 2020). Membrane distillation is a thermally driven process to treat water to eliminate the nonvolatile substance.…”

“…Many researchers explored electrospinning, wet spinning, and phase inversion to the separation membrane and found electrospinning techniques are more efficient and gained much prominence. Electrospun membranes produced by the electrospinning technique have a lesser thickness, exhibit uniform dispersion, and have a high surface area, enhancing hydrophobicity and reducing resistance (Konni et al, 2022;Bölgen and Vaseashta, 2021;Vara et al, 2020) . Moreover, based on the methods and synthesis for fabricating these membranes, these can be polymeric composites; the membranes' preparation procedures and compositions determine their properties (Ismail et al, 2020).…”

“…Nanofibers produced by the electrospun technique exhibit significantly enhanced properties due to their surface/ mass ratio. Many researchers have proposed fluoropolymers and hydrocarbons for the fabrication of membranes by using electrospun techniques as they exhibit higher stability, entrapments of ions, minor pore blockage, and lower operational costs (Konni et al, 2022;Bölgen and Vaseashta, 2021;Vara et al, 2020). Many researchers have researched polypropylene, polyvinylidene difluoride, Creslan 61, polystyrene etc., in water applications (Elmarghany et al, 2020;Konni et al, 2022).…”