PFI-TT: Bringing Open Source Innovation and Resilient Hydraulic Designs to Municipal Drinking Water Treatment Infrastructure

这项创新伙伴关系-技术转化（PFI-TT）项目的更广泛影响和商业潜力将是为需要升级或扩大其饮用水基础设施的美国城镇提供先进的、有弹性的技术。这项技术的早期原型已经改变了几个偏远城镇，为83,000多人提供可靠、高质量的自来水。下一代水处理技术比上个世纪开发的高度机械化系统要简单得多。市政规模的饮用水处理过程的新系列依赖于对颗粒，流体和流动之间相互作用的先进理解，以更有效地去除病原体和其他污染物。该工艺设计采用目前最节能的技术，使用特殊的粘附纳米颗粒去除颗粒、病原体和一些溶解的污染物。对社会的好处将是超低能耗、弹性、防黑客、高性能的水处理基础设施，可以在不依赖计算机或机械化系统的情况下轻松运行。拟议的技术将大大降低维护和升级水处理基础设施的成本，并有望推动水处理行业进入竞争和创新的新时代。该项目将促进对颗粒、病原体和溶解污染物去除机制的理解。在过去的几十年里，核心的饮用水处理技术在很大程度上停滞不前，因为人们对其潜在的机制不了解，而且有必要依靠经验设计。这为发展核心饮用水处理工艺的科学创造了机会，然后大大改进了这些设计。提出的研究和发展将建立在最近发展的水力絮凝模型和对上流流化絮凝过滤器中主要颗粒去除机制的新见解之上。这项研究的目标是利用新的见解到治疗过程，开始优化他们的设计。一个使用地表水水源的中试规模设施将用于测试：1)新设计的上流式流化絮凝过滤器（UFFF）进口扩散器和射流反流系统，2)UFFF深度，3)更紧凑的管式沉降系统，以及4)堆叠式快速砂滤提取系统。性能将使用颗粒计数器、浊度计、测量溶解有机物的紫外线计和测量病原体去除效率的病原体面板来测量。目标是为下一代水处理技术提供设计建议。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The broader impact/commercial potential of this Partnerships for Innovation - Technology Translation (PFI-TT) project will be the availability of advanced, resilient technologies to U.S. towns and cities that need to upgrade or expand their drinking water infrastructure. Early prototypes of this technology have transformed several remote towns by providing reliable, high-quality water on tap to over 83,000 people. The next generation of water treatment technologies are less complex than the highly mechanized systems that were developed in the last century. The new series of municipal-scale drinking water treatment processes relies on an advanced understanding of the interactions between particles, fluid, and flow to more efficiently remove pathogens and other contaminants. The process designs remove particles, pathogens, and some dissolved contaminants using special adhesive nanoparticles with the most energy efficient technologies currently available. The benefits to society will be ultra-low energy, resilient, hack-proof, high-performing water treatment infrastructure that can easily be operated without reliance on computers or mechanized systems. The proposed technology will substantially reduce the cost of maintaining and upgrading water treatment infrastructure and are expected to propel a new era of competition and innovation in the water treatment sector.The proposed project will advance the understanding of particle, pathogen, and dissolved contaminant removal mechanisms. The core drinking water treatment technologies have largely stagnated in the past decades because the underlying mechanisms were not understood and it was necessary to rely on empirical designs. This created an opportunity to develop the science of the core drinking water treatment processes and then dramatically improve those designs. The proposed research and development will build on the recently developed hydraulic flocculation model and new insights into the dominant particle removal mechanism in upflow fluidized floc filters. The goal of the research is to use the new insights into the treatment processes to begin to optimize their design. A pilot scale facility using a surface water source will be configured to test: 1) new designs for the upflow fluidized floc filter (UFFF) inlet diffuser and jet reverser system, 2) the UFFF depth, 3) a more compact tube settler system, and 4) stacked rapid sand filter extraction system. Performance will be measured using particle counters, turbidimeters, a UV meter to measure dissolved organics, and a pathogen panel to measure pathogen removal efficiency. The goal is to develop design recommendations for the next generation of water treatment technologies.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.