Treatment of oil-in-water emulsion using tubular ceramic membrane acquired from locally available low-cost inorganic precursors

Abstract

A B S T R A C TThis article highlights the fabrication of ceramic membrane with tubular configuration using locally available inexpensive clays and its application in oil-in-water emulsion treatment. Extrusion technique was employed to manufacture the tubular-shaped ceramic membrane having length, outer, and inner diameters of 100, 12, and 6.5 mm, respectively. Clay powders and the fabricated membrane were characterized using standard techniques such as particle size distribution, scanning electron microscopy, energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction, thermogravimetric (TG), and field emission scanning electron microscopy analysis. The fabricated membrane possessed porosity of 50%, average pore diameter of 0.339 μm, and mechanical strength of 12 MPa with relatively good corrosion resistance in acidic and basic conditions. The effect of various operating conditions such as pressure (69-345 kPa) and cross-flow velocity (0.044-0.132 m/s) on the microfiltration process of oil-in-water emulsion was studied using this membrane with a fixed feed oil concentration of 100 mg/L in a cross flow manner. The research findings indicated that the rejection of oil slightly decreased with the rise in pressure. The best rejection of 99.88% was obtained with permeate flux of 3.40 × 10 −5 m 3 /m 2 s at an applied pressure of 68 kPa after 1 h of experimental run. These results demonstrated the application of the fabricated membrane in oil-in-water emulsion treatment and the treated water can be directly discharged into water bodies. Finally, the estimation of the manufacturing cost of the acquired membrane was presented in detail.

Synthesis and characterization of tubular ceramic ultrafiltration membrane from coal fly ash

“…At higher temperature, thermal decomposition of sodium carbonate occurred to form the CO 2 which create pores in the ceramic membrane during the sintering process. Similarly, the decomposition of other inorganic materials increasing the thermal stability of the membrane (Emani et, al., 2013; Ghosh et, al., 2013; Kaur et, al., 2016; Kumar et, al., 2016). After 750°C, the weight loss of the precursors was observed as trivial.…”

“…Glycerine, methylcellulose, starch, and PVA are reported as a few successful additives (Achiou et al, 2017;Cheng et al, 2020;Jedidi et al, 2009;Liu et al, 2016). Sodium carbonate, calcium carbonate, magnesium carbonates, coconut shell, egg shell and banana peel are reported as successful pore-forming agents to prepare the low-cost membranes at different sintering temperatures (Kamgang-Syapnjeu et al, 2020;Kaur et al, 2016;Kumar et al, 2016;Mouiya et al, 2019). In this regard, the different researchers reported the synthesis of ceramic CFA is an abundant waste material generated in thermal power plants creating solid waste management problems in the industries.…”

“…Similarly, few more literature also reported about the preparation of circular disk ceramic membranes using the uniaxial compaction method (Fu et al., 2019; Fan et al., 2021; Gupta et al., 2020; Rawat & Bulasara, 2018). However, those disk membranes are not comfortable for high membrane area per volume ratio, volume, fluid flow, as well as flow properties and symmetric shape (Kumar et al., 2016; Majouli et al., 2012; Wei et al., 2016). Mostly, tubular and hollow ceramic membranes are suitable for separation and purification applications in industries to achieve efficient results (Bakhtiari et al., 2011; Kumar et al., 2016).…”

“…However, those disk membranes are not comfortable for high membrane area per volume ratio, volume, fluid flow, as well as flow properties and symmetric shape (Kumar et al., 2016; Majouli et al., 2012; Wei et al., 2016). Mostly, tubular and hollow ceramic membranes are suitable for separation and purification applications in industries to achieve efficient results (Bakhtiari et al., 2011; Kumar et al., 2016). But only limited works are reported on the fabrication of ceramic tubular membranes in the literature by using other precursors.…”