Techno-economic assessment of a hybrid forward osmosis and membrane distillation system for agricultural water recovery.

[Display omitted] • FO-MD process can yield a high water quality for most of the AD effluents. • Obtained water fluxes < 2 Lm−2h−1 are too low for industrial application at present. • The energy consumption of the FO-MD was 100 times less than electricity produced. • The cost of water produced by the FO-MD system was 1.29 $ m−3. • For the FO-MD system to be cost efficient, the water flux must exceed 14 Lm−2h−1. Despite the potential of forward osmosis (FO) and membrane distillation (MD) to treat difficult waste streams, these technologies have not yet been applied on a large scale in industry. Also, economic analyses which are crucial in a commercialization of these technologies are not presently available. In this work a techno-economic study of water recovery from anaerobic digested (AD) effluents by a FO-MD hybrid process was performed. OPEX and CAPEX calculations were used to estimate a final water treatment cost based on experimental laboratory results which demonstrated that the FO-MD process can yield a high water quality for AD effluents. However the obtained water fluxes (<2 Lm−2h−1) were too low for industrial application in the present form of the FO-MD process. The energy consumption of the FO-MD system was 0.52 kWh m−3 which is 100 times lower than the electricity produced from 1 m3 of AD effluents based on methane energy yields. The cost of water produced by the FO-MD system was 1.29 $ m−3, assuming water flux of 10 Lm−2h−1 and membrane cost of 36 $ m−2. Sensitivity analysis shows that the cost of membrane module has a high influence on water cost at fluxes < 8 Lm−2h−1. Analysis shows that for the FO-MD system to be cost efficient, the water flux must exceed 14 Lm−2h−1. Thus our techno-economic assessment shows directions where the technology should be improved in order to be technically feasible and industrially applicable. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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