Concentration of brines from RO desalination plants

by natural evaporation
J.M. Arnal, M. Sancho*, I. Iborra, J.M. Goza lvez, A. Santafe , J. Lora
Chemical and Nuclear Engineering Department, Polytechnic University of Valencia,
Camino de Vera, s/n, 46022 Valencia, Spain
Tel. 34 963 879639; Fax 34 963 877639; email: msanchof@iqn.upv.es
Received 21 January 2005; accepted 21 February 2005
Abstract
Development of desalination technologies in recent years, specially in the case of reverse osmosis process, enables
now the massive production of water with a moderate cost, providing flexible solutions to different necessities within
the fields of population supply, industry and agriculture. The great development of reverse osmosis (RO) technology
has been a consequence of several factors such as energy consumption reduction and membrane cost decrease.
Nevertheless, one of the problems of RO desalination plants is the generation of a concentrate effluent (brine) that
must be properly managed. In the case of seawater desalination plants the brine is usually discharge to the sea since
they are placed near it. However, in the case of brackish water desalination, brine management can be specially critic
if the plants are placed far from the coast and far from any public channel or water-treatment plant where discharge
the brine. The best option in this case is to concentrate the brine by reverse osmosis up to the technical limit of the
process (around 70 g/L of salinity), and after that continue concentrating by means of evaporation until getting a
solid waste that can be valued or directly managed by an authorised company. The aim of this work is to asses the
viability of using natural evaporation (without heat supply) opposite to conventional evaporation for concentrating
brines from brackish desalination plants. The main purpose of applying natural evaporation is to reduce the energy
consumption of the treatment and the associated costs.
Keywords: Brine; Concentration; Reverse osmosis; Evaporation; Energy
1. Introduction
Desalination technologies have experienced a
great development in recent years, especially the
reverse osmosis process, which enables now the
massive production of water with a moderate
cost, providing flexible solutions to different
necessities within the fields of population supply,
industry and agriculture. The great development
Presented at the Conference on Desalination and the Environment, Santa Margherita, Italy, 2226 May 2005.
European Desalination Society.
0011-9164/05/$ See front matter 2005 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved
*Corresponding author.
Desalination 182 (2005) 435439
doi:10.1016/j.desal.2005.02.036
of reverse osmosis (RO) technology has been a
consequence of several factors such as energy
consumption reduction and membrane cost
decrease. Nevertheless, one of the problems of
RO desalination plants is the generation of a
concentrate effluent (brine) that must be properly
managed in order to avoid environmental con-
tamination. This problematic is different in
sea water desalination and in brackish water
desalination.
In the case of seawater desalination plants
the problem is solved since these plants are
usually placed near the coast, so brine can be
discharge to the sea through brine pipes or
submarine emissaries, in a place where it is
quickly diffused in the marine medium.
However, the management of brine from
brackish desalination plants can be a significant
problem in case they are placed far from the
coast (inland plants) or far from any public
channel where discharge the brine. Some of
the options for brine disposal from inland desa-
lination plants are deep well injection, evapora-
tion ponds, disposal into surface water bodies,
disposal to municipal sewers, concentration
into solid salts (evaporation) and irrigation of
plants tolerant to high salinities. The main
factors that influence the selection of a disposal
method, among others, are: the volume or
quantity of concentrate, the quality of concen-
trate, physical and geographical location of the
discharge point, capital and operational costs,
etc. [1]. The cost of brine disposal ranges from 5
to 33% of the total cost of desalination, being
the disposal cost of inland desalination plant
higher than that of plants disposing brine into
the sea [2].
We consider that one suitable option to
manage this brine from inland plants is to
concentrate it by means of reverse osmosis
up to the operational limit of the process
(around 70 g/L of salinity), and after it crys-
tallize the concentrate liquid by evaporation
until getting a solid waste that can be reused
(one application of brine is the production of
salt or other minerals with a commercial
application [3,4]) or directly managed by an
authorised company. This management option
can be extended to brine from seawater
desalination plants and desalination of any was-
tewater from an industrial process.
Evaporation techniques are the most suita-
ble ones for concentrating brines, since their
application allow to obtain a solid waste more
easy to be managed than the original waste and
a decontaminated liquid flow that can be
directly discharged or even reused. However,
one of the main disadvantages of conventional
evaporation processes is the economical and
environmental cost associated with the produc-
tion of the thermal energy necessary for the
process. Because of that, this research work
aims to assess the viability of applying evapora-
tion without heating (under environmental
conditions) with the main purpose of reducing
energy consumption.
Evaporation under environmental condi-
tions (natural evaporation) has the disad-
vantage of requiring large earth extensions
since the productivity of the process is
quite low (around 4 L
.
m
2
.
d
1
). This
drawback can be overcome by using wet sur-
faces (capillaries or clothes) exposed to wind
action, so surface density would be high
enough to generate a proper evaporation
flow with a minimum energy consumption
[5]. Hence, the surfaces of the system would
wet by means of capillarity and the water
would evaporate while the solids of the
brine would crystallize on the surfaces. The
final solid waste could be managed by an
authorised company or could be reused, and
the evaporated liquid, after condensation,
could be also reused or directly discharged.
In order to assess the viability of applying
natural evaporation to the concentration of
brines coming from brackish desalination
plants or from wastewater treatment, some
436 J.M. Arnal et al. / Desalination 182 (2005) 435439
experiments were carried out in which eva-
poration performance in different configura-
tions was assessed. This paper describes some
of these experiments and the main results
obtained.
2. Experimental procedure
Some experimental tests were carried out
in a laboratory scale with an industrial
wastewater with the following average
characteristics:
pH = 7.5,
conductivity = 27 mS/cm,
total solids = 56 g/L.
Three different sets of experiments were
performed. The first set of experiments con-
sisted of natural evaporation tests in two
identical containers with 8 L of capacity
each one. One of the containers was
equipped with capillary adsorbents and the
other one without any adsorbent (represent-
ing the blank or reference). The objective of
this experiment was to assess adsorbent per-
formance from the point of view of the
quantity of water that is evaporated.
Periodically, the difference of water level
from the previous measurement was taken,
as well as water conductivity and air
temperature.
In the second set of experiments, differ-
ent kind of materials and shapes were tested
as adsorbents with the aim of selecting the
most suitable one for being used in the
natural evaporation process. The following
four adsorbents were tested in these
experiments:
Adsorbent 1: cylindrical cloth made of
reprocessing cotton (80%) and synthetic
fibre (20%) with a diameter of 4 mm.
Adsorbent 2: rectangular cloth made of
viscose (80%) and polyester (20%) with a
perimeter of 26 mm.
Adsorbent 3: rectangular cloth made of
cellulose (65%) and cotton (35%) with a
perimeter of 26 mm.
Adsorbent 4: cylindrical cloth made of
polyamide with a diameter of 1.5 mm.
Each adsorbent was placed inside a flask
with a capacity of 1 L that was filled with
100 mL of wastewater. Periodically, the loss of
weight of each flask was measured, as well as
ambient temperature.
Finally, the third set of experiments consisted
of assessing the effect of air velocity in evapora-
tion performance. These tests were performed
under different environmental conditions with
air speeds varying in the rank between 1.8 and
7.2 km/h. Relative humidity, air speed and tem-
perature were measured periodically, as well as
weight difference with regard to previous meas-
urement. Each experiment lasted until all the
liquid inside the flask was evaporated. The
experimental assembly was the same as the one
described in the second set of experiments.
3. Results and discussion
3.1. Effect of adsorbents
The experimental results of the first set of
experiments in which the effect of adsorbents
was assessed are shown in Fig. 1. This figure
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
0 100 200 300 400 500 600
Time (hours)
V
o
l
u
m
e

(
L
)
Without ads orbents
With ads orbents
Fig. 1. Evaporated volume with and without adsorbents.
J.M. Arnal et al. / Desalination 182 (2005) 435439 437
shows the evolution with time of the volume
of water that was evaporated in each con-
tainer, with and without adsorbents.
It can be clearly seen that the evaporated
volume when using adsorbents is significantly
higher than in the case of not using adsor-
bents, especially after 170 h of test when eva-
poration with adsorbents reached values
100% higher than without adsorbents.
Furthermore, the increase of conductivity in
the container with adsorbents was also higher
than in the container without adsorbents.
According to this, it can be stated that eva-
poration improves significantly by using
adsorbents.
3.2. Selection of the most suitable adsorbent
Fig. 2 presents the main results of the
second set of experiments in which four
adsorbents were tested. This figure shows
the evolution with time of the mass inside
the flask for the four tested adsorbents. The
mass of all the flasks decreased with time due
to the quantity of water evaporated. It can be
seen that the amount of evaporated water
was significantly higher in the case of adsor-
bent 3. This results were repeated in similar
experiments under different environmental
conditions. So, it can be said that adsorbent
3 is the most suitable one for being used in
natural evaporation because increases process
productivity.
3.3. Effect of air velocity
In the third set of experiments the effect of
different air velocities were assessed. Fig. 3
shows the evolution with time of the mass
inside the flask under two different environ-
mental conditions that represent different air
velocity, v
1
and v
2
, being v
1
higher than v
2
.
As it can be seen in the figure, the amount
of evaporated water increases as air velocity
is higher. So it can be stated that higher air
velocity improves evaporation process, and
that improvement is even higher when using
adsorbents to increase evaporation rate.
4. Conclusions
The main conclusion of this work is that
natural evaporation is a viable process for
being applied to the concentration of brines
from desalination plants. According to the
experimental results it can be stated that:
evaporation productivity can be improved
by using adsorbents for increasing evapora-
tion surface;
0
20
40
60
80
100
120
0 50 100 150 200
Time (hours)
M
a
s
s

(
g
r
a
m
s
)
adsorbent 1
adsorbent 2
adsorbent 3
adsorbent 4
Fig. 2. Mass decrease due to evaporation with four
different adsorbents.
0
20
40
60
80
100
120
0 50 100 150 200 250 300
Time (hours)
M
a
s
s

(
g
r
a
m
s
)
v1
v2
Fig. 3. Effect of air velocity in the natural evapora-
tion with adsorbents.
438 J.M. Arnal et al. / Desalination 182 (2005) 435439
the most suitable adsorbent, within the tested
ones, for being used in capillary evaporation
are rectangular cloths made of cellulose (65%)
and cotton (35%) with a perimeter of 26 mm;
evaporation productivity can also be
improved increasing air velocity, although it
is limited by the blowing of solids to the eva-
porated water.
After these successful results, further
experiments have to be carried out in order to
define the characteristics of a pilot plant and to
optimise the operation parameters.
Acknowledgements
Authors would like to express their grati-
tude to all the people who have participated
in this work, especially to the researchers
J. Cha fer and F. Mar n.
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