Effect of temperature on energy consumption and recovery rate of the reverse osmosis brackish systems in a different arrangement

Abstract

One of the first water treatment technologies used by humans is Reverse Osmosis (RO). It has become a sustainable alternative solution to the problem of water scarcity in the current world conditions. In this research, the effects of temperature and pH on efficiency, energy consumption, and outlet water quality from simple single-stage RO systems, single-stage hybrid, simple two-stage, and two-stage hybrid are investigated using RO software. The results depict that at all temperatures, the two-stage RO system is more efficient in terms of efficiency, and the hybrid two-stage system has the best performance in terms of energy consumption. Moreover, the pH of the water entering the system has no effect on the efficiency and energy consumption of desalination plants. In terms of water quality, all the four desalination plants reduced the concentration of harmful ions to the desired level, but single-stage systems outperformed two-stage systems. In terms of corrosion index, two-stage systems outperformed single-stage systems. Furthermore, the corrosion rate of water could be significantly reduced by increasing the temperature and adding sodium hydroxide. In addition, the obtained results showed that the operating pressure on the RO system decreased as the temperature increased. © 2022 Sharif University of Technology. All rights reserved.