title: Irreversible membrane fouling abatement through pre-deposited layer of hierarchical porous carbons.
abstract: In this work, dual-templated hierarchical porous carbons (HPCs), produced from a coupled ice-hard templating approach, are shown to be a highly effective solution to the commonly occurring problem of irreversible fouling of low-pressure membranes used for pre-treatment in wastewater reuse. For the first time, dual-templated HPCs, along with their respective counterparts - single-templated meso-porous carbon (MPCs) (without macropores) - are tested in terms of their fouling reduction capacity and ability to remove different effluent organic matter fractions present in wastewater and compared with a commercially available powdered activated carbon (PAC). The synthesized HPCs provided exceptional fouling abatement, a 4-fold higher fouling reduction as compared to the previously reported best performing commercial PAC and ∼2.5-fold better fouling reduction than their respective mesoporous counterpart. Thus, it is shown that not only mesoporosity, but macroporosity is also necessary to achieve high fouling reduction, thus emphasizing the need for dual templating. In the case of HPCs, the pre-deposition technique is also found to outperform the traditional sorbent-feed mixing approach, mainly in terms of removal of fouling components. Based on their superior performance, a high permeability (ultra-low-pressure) membrane consisting of the synthesized HPC pre-deposited on a large pore size membrane support (0.45 μm membrane), is shown to give excellent pre-treatment performance for wastewater reuse application.
authors.affiliation: Water Desalination and Reuse Center, Biological and Environmental Science and Engineering Division, King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), Thuwal 23955-6900, Saudi Arabia.
authors.forename: Juma Z
authors.initials: JZ
authors.lastname: Hamad
authors.affiliation: Water Desalination and Reuse Center, Biological and Environmental Science and Engineering Division, King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), Thuwal 23955-6900, Saudi Arabia.
authors.forename: Rubal
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Dua
authors.affiliation: Water Desalination and Reuse Center, Biological and Environmental Science and Engineering Division, King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), Thuwal 23955-6900, Saudi Arabia.
authors.forename: Novita
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Kurniasari
authors.affiliation: UNESCO-IHE, Institute for Water Education, Department of Environmental Engineering and Water Technology, West vest 7, 2611 AX Delft, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Maria D
authors.initials: MD
authors.lastname: Kennedy
authors.affiliation: Water Desalination and Reuse Center, Biological and Environmental Science and Engineering Division, King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), Thuwal 23955-6900, Saudi Arabia. Electronic address: peng.wang@kaust.edu.sa.
authors.forename: Peng
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.affiliation: Water Desalination and Reuse Center, Biological and Environmental Science and Engineering Division, King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), Thuwal 23955-6900, Saudi Arabia. Electronic address: gary.amy@kaust.edu.sa.
authors.forename: Gary L
authors.initials: GL
authors.lastname: Amy
mesh_terms: D000327:Adsorption; D002244:Carbon / Q000737:chemistry*; D002606:Charcoal / Q000737:chemistry; D005374:Filtration / Q000379:methods*; D008567:Membranes, Artificial; D010539:Permeability; D016062:Porosity; D014865:Waste Disposal, Fluid / Q000379:methods; D062065:Wastewater; D018508:Water Purification / Q000379:methods
chemical_list: D002244:Carbon; D002606:Charcoal; D008567:Membranes, Artificial; D062065:Wastewater
keywords: Biopolymer; Effluent organic matter (EfOM); Hierarchical porous carbon; Irreversible membrane fouling; Powder activated carbon (PAC); Wastewater reuse