EAPSI: Improving Drinking Water Filtration Systems Containing a Superfine Carbon

活性炭用于许多饮用水处理厂和家庭水过滤器，用于去除不需要的溶解化合物。超细粉末活性炭（S-PAC）是一种比传统活性炭粒径小得多的新型材料。由于其尺寸小，S-PAC可以更快地去除污染物，而且质量更少，但由于S-PAC颗粒非常小，因此必须在分配处理过的水之前通过膜过滤去除它们。这种过滤并不容易，因为S-PAC会堵塞膜孔，对过滤器性能产生负面影响。解决这个问题的一种方法可能是在S-PAC到达膜之前通过S-PAC的聚集产生更大的颗粒。本研究将评估各种S-PAC聚集技术在陶瓷膜过滤模块，以提高过滤器的性能。本研究将与日本北海道大学的S-PAC与陶瓷膜结合用于污染物去除的专家Matsui博士合作进行。在以前的工作中，S-PAC颗粒在死端过滤中导致0.1 µm聚合物基膜的膜孔堵塞。用化学凝聚的聚集被证明是成功的，在减少的问题。本研究将评估陶瓷膜的结果是否与聚合物膜相似。陶瓷膜组件将与聚集和解聚的S-PAC一起运行，以测试过滤器性能并与以前的结果进行比较。此外，还将评估天然有机物（NOM）的影响。本研究的结果将有助于了解S-PAC的行为和潜在的未来应用在饮用水处理中去除痕量污染物。这个NSF EAPSI奖是与日本科学促进协会合作资助的。

Activated carbon is used in many drinking water treatment plants and home water filters for the removal of unwanted dissolved compounds. Superfine powdered activated carbon (S-PAC) is a new material that has a much smaller particle size than traditional activated carbon. Due of its small size, S-PAC can remove contaminants faster and with less mass, but since S-PAC particles are very small they must be removed by membrane filtration before treated water is distributed. This filtration is not easy because S-PAC can block the membrane pores, negatively affecting the filter performance. One way around this might be to create larger particles through aggregation of S-PAC before it reaches the membranes. This study will evaluate various S-PAC aggregation techniques within a ceramic membrane filtration module for enhancing filter performance. This research will be carried out in collaboration with Dr. Matsui, an expert in combining S-PAC with ceramic membranes for contaminant removal, at Hokkaido University in Japan.In previous work, S-PAC particles caused marked membrane pore blocking on 0.1 µm polymer-based membranes in dead-end filtration. Aggregation with chemical coagulation was shown to be successful at reducing the problem. This research will evaluate whether the results are similar with ceramic membranes instead of polymer ones. A ceramic membrane module will be operated with aggregated and disaggregated S-PAC to test the filter performance and compare with previous results. Additionally, the effects of natural organic matter (NOM) will be evaluated. Results of this study will contribute towards the understanding of S-PAC behavior and potential future applications for removal of trace contaminants in drinking water treatment. This NSF EAPSI award is funded in collaboration with the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science.