RECENT DEVELOPMENT OF MEMBRANE PROCESSES FOR WATER AND WASTE-WATER TREATMENT

Membranes are presently used at industrial scale for water and waste w ater treatment, but still for limited production. More knowledge of hy drodynamic phenomena has recently resulted in significant technical im provements (backflush, unsteady flow). However an experimental study p erformed at lab scale in a rotating membrane device has shown the comp lexity of the relationship between operating conditions, rejection and filtrate flux. The need for bettering the quality of the water (low t urbidity) and waster water (disinfection) may be in favour of the deve lopment of membrane processes if efficient models allowing simultaneou s optimization of quality and productivity are made available (as was done years ago for deep bed filtration).