| Within the existing technologies for the advanced treatment of wastewaters, the processes with membranes have reached an extraordinary development due mainly to the recent technical advances, the implantation of more and more strict legal requirements in relation to the quality of waters and to its extense field of application, since they allow to reach separations that could not be obtained with other conventional processes. Between the membrane technologies; the reverse osmosis presents a series of advantages that make it attractive for the industrial and urban processes of purification: they have a high capacity of elimination of dissolved compounds and microorganisms, which entails to a effluent of very high quality and for several applications.; The primary target of the present Doctoral Thesis has consisted of studying the behavior of four types different of membranes made by company PRIDESA, before different operation situations (modifying the pretreatment of the feed water, the pressures of operation, the recovery, the fluxes, etc.), using for it wastewater previously treated into an active sludge system. Also different sequences from cleaning for the recovery the original characteristics of membranes have studied. To reach this main objective it is necessary to fulfill the following secondary targets: (1) Study the resistance of membranes to the fouling as much of organic, inorganic and biological type. (2) Study the resistance of membranes to the oxidating substances. (3) Study the physico-chemical and microbiological quality of the water produced by the different membranes and the possible applications from them. (4) Optimizying the cleaning sequences of membranes with the objective to recover the initial conditions of permeability and salt rejection of them. (5) Characterization the deposits on membranes by means of the accomplishment of autopsies.; To the accomplishment of the experimental part of the present Doctoral Thesis, experimental pilot has had itself a plant property of the Dirección General de Calidad de Aguas. This plant is conceived to be able to study a series of complementary processes for the advanced treatment of efluentes by means of reverse osmosis, with the possibility of combining them of different forms being able to produce, and to thus define, an optimal system of treatment. |
