Desalination 267 (2011) 160169

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Desalination
j o u r n a l h o m e p a g e : w w w. e l s ev i e r. c o m / l o c a t e / d e s a l

Membrane ltration of process water at elevated temperaturesA way to increase the capacity of a biogas plant
J. Lindmark a,, E. Thorin a, J. Kastensson b, C.M. Pettersson c
a b c

Energy Division, School of Sustainable Development of Society and Technology, Mlardalen University, P O Box 883, SE-721 23 Vsters, Sweden Mercatus Engineering AB, Hultfredsvgen 33, SE- 598 22 Vimmerby, Sweden Svensk Vxtkraft AB, Gryta, SE-721 87 Vsters, Sweden

a r t i c l e

i n f o

a b s t r a c t
Waste water from a biogas process is often recirculated and mixed with the incoming organic material to produce a feed for the digester. The dry matter (DM) content of the nal mixture should be as high as possible to maximise the capacity of the plant without exceeding the capability of the pumps. This means that the DM content of the recirculated process water has a large impact on the amount of substrate that can be processed. Experiments to reduce the dry matter content of the recirculated process water were carried out using a ceramic ultraltration (UF) membrane. The inuence on the ux through the membrane and the separation efciency at different operation temperatures, 70 C, 90 C and 110 C, were investigated. Higher temperatures resulted in increased ux/ow through the membrane. The DM content was reduced from 4% to 1.6%, corresponding to a 29% increase of new material that could be added to the process. The energy required to heat the membrane when using heat recovery is small compared to the energy of the methane produced from the additional added substrate. The lifespan of the membranes and uncertainties in the substrate DM content have shown to be important for the economic result. 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Article history: Received 1 June 2010 Received in revised form 10 September 2010 Accepted 10 September 2010 Available online 18 October 2010 Keywords: Ultraltration Ceramic membrane Biogas Anaerobic digestion Digester High temperature

1. Introduction A common feature of most biogas plants is the use of high water content in order to produce a well mixed substrate as feed for the digester. Water is added and mixed with the substrate to produce a slurry that can be pumped throughout the plant and facilitates easier mixing of the substrate inside the digester, so called wet fermentation (water content N 85%). This type of process requires a large amount of water. The water consumption can be reduced by recirculating the water back to the process after separation from the fermentation residues. Conventional techniques for treating the water include the use of belt-type presses, chamber lter presses, decanters or centrifuges [1]. These processes do not always separate the desired amount of dry matter (DM) from the process water and reducing the amount of recirculated water limits the addition of substrate in the process. Pumps can only handle a limited amount of DM in the slurry before they fail and if the process water already has a high content of DM it will take up valuable space that could be used for new substrate. The DM in the process water has already gone through the process at least once and is likely to have lost most of its biogas producing potential.

Corresponding author. Box 883, 721 23 Vsters, Sweden. Tel.: +46 21 10 70 44; fax: +46 21 10 13 70. E-mail address: johan.lindmark@mdh.se (J. Lindmark). 0011-9164/$ see front matter 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.desal.2010.09.020

Membrane ltration is a well known technology that has been used in different industries and processes for several years. Membrane lters have many applications including oil and water separation, drinking water treatment, desalination and separation in dairy industries. Ultraltration is used to separate suspended solids and some high molecular weight organic compounds such as proteins from the water phase [2]. Important factors when operating a membrane lter are the ux rate, separation efciency and the long term performance. Each application has different requirements and the function of the membrane has to be evaluated to determine its suitability for each individual process. Membrane ltration technology has been studied for use in anaerobic reactors for different applications [39]. The main focus in most studies is waste water treatment and the reduction of solid material before emitting the water. In these kinds of studies, the process performance is measured as the ability to clean waste water, while the main focus in this study, is the ability to increase biogas production. The production of biogas is the main purpose of the process and the membrane ltration step is included to reduce the content of solid material in the process water to be recirculated in the process. An important aspect of our study is therefore the energy use in the membrane process compared to the improved output of biogas gained by including the membrane unit. One study concerning membrane ltration for cleaning the process water in a biogas plant [10] has been found, but they do not present any detailed results and there is a clear knowledge gap about the effectiveness and economy of such an installation.

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Many different types of membranes are available on the market, each suited to different types of applications. There are limits in operation parameters such as pH, pressure and temperature depending on the material the membrane is made from. The ability of some membranes to withstand temperatures above 100 C opens up the possibility of treating large quantities of liquids in smaller installations. Higher temperatures result in a higher ux or ow through the membrane. By changing the temperature of the liquid the viscosity can be altered to create favourable conditions for the ltration process [11]. However, the cost of running the membrane increases with increasing operating temperature. Experiments carried out in the pulp and paper industry using ceramic UF membranes in the separation of solids in kraft black liquors at different temperatures, have shown that temperature has a large inuence on the ux [12,13]. However, the dry matter content of the ltrated stream was much higher (18%) in those studies than for the application studied here (4%). This study evaluates the use of a UF membrane unit at elevated temperatures for the removal of excess organic material from the process water of the biogas plant Vxtkraft in Vsters, Sweden. The biogas plant uses lay crop silage, fat removal sludge and biowaste from households, restaurants and shops in a co-fermentation process. The fermentation takes place in a 4000 m3 digester. Biowaste is the main substrate, and is supplemented with silage and fat removal sludge for increased biogas production. The biogas produced is used as vehicle fuel, and is equivalent to 1.5 million litres of petroleum per year and the residues from the digester are used as organic fertilizer. When new organic material is added to the digester, it is mixed with the process water to produce a slurry that can be pumped throughout the plant. The process design at the plant relies on a low DM content of up to 10% for the pumps to be able to work. This means that the capacity of the plant to add new organic material is highly dependent on the DM content of the process water. The aim of this study is to investigate the function and economic viability of UF membranes for treating water at a biogas plant. The inuence of the operation temperature on the ux and separation efciency is investigated. Also the inuence on the overall energy balance of the plant by including a membrane ltration step is evaluated. The process water used in the plant is made up of decantate from the already digested material. This recirculation of water has led to problems in the process because of the increasing DM content in the decantate from the centrifuges. According to statistics from the Vxtkraft biogas plant the DM content has almost doubled since the plant began operating in 2005, and is presently at about 4%. This corresponds to a 25% decrease in capacity. This increase in the DM content has occurred gradually over time and has led to the hypothesis that there is a proportion of resilient material that cannot be degraded in the bioreactor which builds up in the digester over time. By reducing the DM content of the process water continuously the former capacity of the plant may be restored and maintained. 2. Method The experiments presented in this study are evaluated, focusing on the energy efciency of the system, the capacity of the biogas process and the economic consequences. The experiments were carried out at the Vxtkraft biogas plant in Vsters, Sweden in a small pilot plant built by Mercatus Engineering AB. The pilot plant has a ceramic UF membrane unit as its main component (see Section 2.1). The experiments were set up using data and experience from earlier tests [14]. The initial tests showed that the membrane lter performed well, with acceptable separation of DM, that a temperature close to 100 C would be suitable for this application and that good heat recovery from the UF lter is necessary for the application to be economically viable. The experimental set up was rened in response to problems detected during the initial study, (Section 2.2). The ow measurements from the previous study [14] were affected by clogging

of the membrane, apparently introduced during early investigations with the pilot plant in another application and ineffective cleaning. Temperature measurements taken during these early experiments also indicated that one of the temperature sensors was showing an inaccurate reading. This sensor was replaced. In order to evaluate the use of membrane ltration of the process water in a biogas plant, four ow rates were used to calculate the power requirements and the economic viability. The ow rates used in the evaluations were 10, 20, 26 and 32 m3 h1. Flow rates of 26 and 32 m3 h1 are relevant to the operation of the Vxtkraft plant and the two lower ow rates (10 and 20 m3 h1) were used to examine the changes in the energy balance and costs when only part of the ow was treated. The process water has a DM content of about 4% and a temperature of 37 C. All experiments were performed at the same pressures to ensure a meaningful comparison between the uxes at different temperatures. At present, the ow of process water at the Vxtkraft plant is around 32 m3 h1 or 8.89 kg s1, assuming a density of 1000 kg m3. 2.1. Pilot plant conguration The pilot plant used in this study was constructed for batch tests and is limited to the volume of the inlet tank. The experimental set up consists of a 70 dm3 inlet tank for ltration of process water. The temperature of the process water being ltered is maintained with a 6 kW oil heater. During operation of the UF the process water is pumped through a circulation loop and the membrane, at a transmembrane pressure of 2.0 105 Pa, which pushes the liquid through the pores. The water becomes more concentrated with organic material in each pass as the liquid escapes through the membrane, producing a permeate. The permeate can then be recirculated back to the inlet tank or withdrawn to an outlet tank for analysis. The permeate withdrawn to the outlet tank ows through a cooler to avoid steam formation and thus loss of water from the system. The experimental setup includes thermometers and pressure meters for monitoring and controling the process. The energy consumption of the pump can be read from an electricity meter. It is also possible to measure the permeate ow with a built in ow meter which can measure ows up to 230 L h1. The pilot plant conguration is shown in Fig. 1. At the end of every batch experiment the inlet tank holds the concentrated liquid and the outlet tank holds the permeate liquid. The ceramic membrane element used in the experiment is produced by Atech Innovations Gmbh and is of the type 37/3.8 1200, meaning that it has 37 channels each with an internal diameter of 3.8 mm and a length of 1200 mm. This membrane has an area of 0.53 m2, a pore size of 50 nm, a molecular weight cut off at 300 kD and like most membrane lters it is set up for crossow ltration with the feed owing parallel to the membrane to avoid clogging. A certain amount of build up on the membrane is tolerated and has no negative effect on the ux or operation of the unit. Some researchers believe that this secondary layer can have the same ltering function as the membrane lter itself [15]. 2.2. Experimental set up The membrane experiments were conducted at three different operation temperatures70, 90 and 110 C in the pilot plant described in Section 2.1. Four batches were run at 110 C, two at 90 C and one at 70 C. High operating temperatures are of interest because the application requires a high ux to be able to handle the large amount of process water that is to be treated. Membrane experiments on digestate (digested at 37 C) was carried out at 30 C with a similar setup as used in the current study and it showed a ux of 40 L h1 m2 [16] which is quite low for the volumes handled at the

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Inlet pipe

Inlet tank Membrane Water cooler Outlet tank

P 6 kW Oil heater T T P Concentrate outlet Circulation pump P P: Pressure meter T: Thermometer F: Flow meter

Fig. 1. Conguration of the membrane ltration unit.

plant. However, lower temperatures could be advantageous from an energy standpoint. Prior to lling the inlet tank, the process water was ltered with a 1 mm sieve to remove large particles such as sand, which can clog the lter, and samples were taken for determination of the DM content. The process water was then circulated through the heater and the concentrate side of the lter until it reached the desired operation temperature. Heating the water with the oil heater is slow and it is not possible to stop the water heating beyond the desired temperature if the oil temperature gets too high. Because of this, the ltration tests were done in a temperature range of several degrees. The ltration was then started and the permeate was recirculated to the inlet tank until the ow of the permeate stabilised. The transmodule pressure and transmembrane pressure were kept around 2.4 105 Pa and around 2.0 105 Pa respectively during the operation to ensure that the different ow and temperature conditions were comparable. The pressure just after the inlet tank was also recorded and kept below 4 105 Pa during operation to prevent damage to the pump. Permeate was withdrawn to the outlet tank when the permeate ow stabilised. The permeate ow to the outlet tank was determined both by a built in ow meter and manually using a measuring cylinder of 1 dm3 and a stop watch. Three 250 ml samples were taken from the permeate during the ltration process. The lter unit was run until 3545 dm3 of the permeate had been withdrawn. At this stage there was either a pressure loss across the membrane or the ow of permeate was too low, which caused low levels of liquid in the inlet tank and the circulation loop. After each batch experiment the liquid in the inlet tank was allowed to cool down until the next day to prevent the sludge from boiling and drying onto the membrane surface. 250 ml samples were then taken from the concentrate in the inlet tank to determine the DM content. The remainder of the concentrate was removed from the inlet tank and the membrane was washed by circulating water repeatedly (23 times) until the efuent was clear. 2.3. Process water The process water used in these experiments is made up of decantate from the digester that is pre-ltered with a 1 mm sieve to remove large particles such as sand, which can clog or damage the

membrane. The DM content of the process water varies slightly from day to day and after the pre-ltration the process water had a mean DM content of 4.15% with a standard deviation of 0.14%. Because the biogas process is a biological process operated at narrow pH value of around 7.5 to 8 there is not much variation in pH value of the process water that needs to be considered when ltrating the liquid. 2.4. Determination of dry matter content The DM content was determined with a moisture balance (MA 45 Sartorius) as described in the previous study [14]. The value was determined as the mean of at least two samples. The determination of the DM content with the moisture balance was checked against the standard method [17] for samples from two ltration tests. 2.5. Energy use and production capacity The energy consumption of the membrane ltration step at the Vxtkraft biogas plant was estimated and compared with the possible increases in gas production. The extra energy needed for the membrane ltration step is required to heat the process water from 37 C to the operating temperature of the membrane ltration unit and to pump the water through the lter. By using regenerative heat exchangers most of the energy used for heating the water could be recovered. Some of the energy used for running the pumps is converted to heat and may contribute to the heating in the process, but this is not considered in the calculations. Reducing the DM content in the process water also results in energy savings in the rest of the process because of reduced pumping and heating costs. The extra heating power required can be calculated from Eq. (1) [18]:   P = mCwater Toperation Tin 1

where P [kW] is the power, Cwater [kJ kg1 K1] is the specic heat for water, m [kg s1] is the process water mass ow, Toperation is the membrane ltration operation temperature and Tin is the temperature of the incoming process water to the ltration unit. The value 4.2 kJ kg1 K1 has been used for Cwater. When the amount of DM in the recirculated water in the biogas plant decreases, the amount of

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fresh organic material put into the process can be increased, meaning that the amount of biogas produced can be increased. An estimation has been done that the increased amount of biowaste in the process produces 82 m3 of methane per ton of wet substrate after 20 days retention time [19]. The theoretical increase in the biogas production can then be calculated from Eq. (2): Vincrease = 8210
3

    mrecirc DMrecirc;old DMrecirc;new = DMbiowaste 2

where mpermeate [m3 s1] is the mass ow of permeate, mdecantate [kg s1] is the mass ow of recirculated process water available for the membrane ltration, DMdecantate [%] is the percentage of DM in the recirculated process water coming from the centrifuges, DMpermeate [%] is the percentage of DM in the recirculated permeate, DMconcentrate [%] is the percentage of DM in the outgoing concentrate from the membrane. The density of the permeate is assumed to be 1000 kg m3. Combining Eqs. (4) and (6) indicates the capacity to add more organic material to the process. 2.6. Cost determination A number of factors must be considered when determining the capital and operational costs of a membrane installation. The most important factor to consider is the ux over the membrane and the ow to be treated. The economic lifespan of the investment is assumed to be 15 years. All prices and costs in this study have been calculated from Swedish currency (SEK) using the exchange rate on 13th March 2009 of 11.1 SEK per Euro. This cost determination is affected by the global economic situation and the decreased value of the Swedish currency. There has been an increase in the exchange rate of around 14 to 16% which has affected the prices of equipment, materials and chemicals used. The operational cost of the membrane includes the power requirement, chemicals for cleaning, maintenance and replacement of the membranes. The energy needed for the pumps is around 22 kW per UF unit in use (with an active surface of 13 m2) and additional energy is needed to heat the process water before ltration (see Eq. (1)). The price of energy used in the calculations is set to 0.054 per kWh. As no prolonged experiments have been carried out there is no data available to determine the best cleaning frequency of the membrane. After the initial tests the membrane was cleaned with nitric acid with good results. Nitric acid is widely distributed, commonly used in the industry, and can be used in a full scale installation. This type of chemical does not pose any problem for the use of the digestate and the concentrate from the ltration as organic fertilizers for ecological farming. Chemical cleaning is assumed, based on experiences from other applications, to be carried out approximately 1 to 2 times a week using 1 m3 of 3% nitric acid for every wash for the entire installation. This amount could be optimized for the size of the installation to save money, especially for smaller installations. The prices of nitric acid are around 2.6 per kg for 53% nitric acid and 2.8 per kg for 62% nitric acid, meaning that each wash costs between 136 and 144 , an annual cost between 7.100 and 14.200 depending on the frequency of the cleaning and the amount of chemical used. This cost is affected by the amounts bought since the unit prices are lower for larger quantities. Maintenance of the equipment is set at 1.5% of the non-membrane capital cost as reported by Owen et al. [20]. This study has been done exclusively with ceramic membranes because of their ability to run at high temperatures. The lifetime of a ceramic membrane is estimated at between 3 and 6 years when operating working with similar grades of water according to the experience of Mercatus Engineering AB. The lifespan of the membrane in the installation considered in this paper is calculated for both the lower and higher limits of this estimated lifespan. The number of membrane units will vary depending on the amount of process water the installation is required to treat. Each UF unit contains 24 membranes, which each cost 750 to replace, which adds up to a total cost of 18000 per UF unit. The price estimates were supplied by Mercatus Engineering AB and include the cost of the UF units, control systems, the power feed and the surrounding system in form of pumps, pipes, etc. Labor costs for the installation and testing of the facility are also included in this estimate. Some costs are location specic, such as pipes that connect the UF to the plant and tanks that might be needed for on-site water

where Vincrease [m3 s1] is the volume ow of the increased amount of biogas produced, mrecirc [kg s1] is the mass ow of recirculated process water, DMrecirc,old [%] is the percentage of dry matter in the recirculated process water without the membrane ltration unit, DMrecirc,new [%] is the percentage of dry matter in the recirculated process water if membrane ltration is used, and DMbiowaste [%] is the percentage of dry matter in the incoming biowaste. The DM content of the biowaste varies between 30% and 44% [19] which gives an uncertainty in the gas yield from the organic material. In this study we base estimates on both the upper and lower limits of DM content. The corresponding power can then be calculated by multiplying the volume ow of additional biogas with the heating value for methane. The nal slurry produced from the process water and the biowaste should have a DM content of around 10% for optimal operation of the plant. The DM of the slurry can be calculated from Eq. (3):
DMslurry = DMbiowaste mbiowaste + DMrecirc mrecirc = mrecirc + mbiowaste 3

where DMslurry [%] is the percentage of DM in the mix/slurry produced from the organic waste and the process water, DMbiowaste [%] is the percentage of DM in the incoming biowaste, mbiowaste [kg s1] is the mass ow of the organic material going into the process, DMrecirc [%] is the percentage of DM in the recirculated process water, and mrecirc [kg s1] is the mass of recirculated process water. Note that the effect of the ltration can be seen by swapping mrecirc and DMrecirc for the permeate values. Thus, from Eq. (3) we can derive two new equations to calculate the amount of water or bio waste that is needed for a specic scenario. Eq. (4) shows how the capacity to digest biowaste varies with the DM content of the recirculated process water:
    mbiowaste = mrecirc DMslurry mrecirc DMrecirc = DMbiowaste DMslurry 4

Eq. (5) shows how the amount of water needed for the process varies with the DM content of the recirculated water:
    mrecirc = mbiowaste DMbiowaste mbiowaste DMslurry = DMslurry DMrecirc 5

During the ltration process some water is lost with the concentrate from the membrane lter. The DM content of the concentrate and the permeate from the lter and the mass balance of the system can provide information about the amount of liquid that is available to the biogas process after ltration. Fig. 2 shows a simplied process map of the biogas plant with the membrane unit installed. The ow of organic solids and water through the process can be followed in this process map and can be used to indicate where the membrane ltration unit should be installed to most effectively reduce inefciencies caused by increased DM content. The amount of process water available after ltration can be calculated from Eq. (6): mpermeate = mdecantate DMconcentrate DMdecantate   = DMconcentrate DMpermeate

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storage. To keep the calculations more general no location specic costs have been included in these calculations and no labour costs. The price estimates were used to formulate Eq. (7): Cmem = CUF n + Ccon 1:1n2 + Csys + 1800n1 7

where Cmem [] is the cost of the membrane installation, CUF is the installation cost of each UF unit (99.000 ), n is the number of membrane units installed into the system, Ccon is the starting cost of the control system (119.000 ) and Csys is the starting cost of the power feed and surrounding systems for the rst membrane unit (36.000 ) which will be increased with 1.800 with each new installed unit. The number of membrane units used depends on the amount of permeate that needs to be produced and the ux of the membrane. The number of UF units used can be calculated from Eq. (8): n = Vpermeate 36001000 = J1 = 13 8

where n is the number of membrane units installed, Vpermeate[m3 s1] is the volume ow of the permeate required, and J [L h1 m2] is the ux through the membrane. Each membrane unit of this type has an active surface of 13 m2. 3. Results and discussion 3.1. Flux and separation efciency A series of tests was conducted at the three temperature levels 70, 90 and 110 C keeping the pressures, volumes, and DM content at a constant level. Table 1 shows the different tests and the ux values that were reached during the experiments. The table shows that the ux over the membrane increased substantially as the temperature increased. For tests 1 to 3 the temperature level was 110 C, for tests 4 and 5 it was 90 C, and for test 6 the temperature level was 70 C. After test 6 was carried out, a follow up test (test 7) was carried out at 110 C. This test indicated an increased tendency towards clogging or build up of a fouling layer at the lower temperature. Prolonged high temperature experiments, on the other hand, revealed a tendency to do the opposite and break down or remove material that hindered the ltration. A lower ux was seen in test 1, but the ux increased as more process water was ltered at the same high temperature level (tests 2 and 3). The use of high temperatures for washing membranes to dissolve foulants is common [11] and it may be this self cleansing effect that is seen in the results. Some of the results from the experiments at the different temperatures are also shown in Fig. 3. This gure shows the ux

from the start of the permeate withdrawal until the end of each ltration. When viewing the graphs for the tests at different temperature levels it is evident that a higher temperature of the liquid leads to a higher permeate ow which is crucial for treating large amounts of process water. This is due to that the viscosity of the uid decreases when the temperature increases [11]. While Table 1 only shows the maximum ux during the ltration, Fig. 3 shows how the ux varies during the ltration. At 70 C the curve seems to be leveling out at around 6070 L h1 m2and at 90 C at around 90 100 L h1 m2. For the highest temperature level the ux never levels out in these experiments. When the permeate was released to the outlet tank the high ux in combination with the relatively low water volume in the inlet tank is masking any type of stabilized ow through the membrane. Just like in the 90 C experiment the ux is decreasing in the beginning of the 100 C test but it never has time to stabilize before the inlet tank is empty and the ux decreases because of low liquid levels in the inlet tank. Even during longer times of recirculation of the permeate to the inlet tank the ux did not level out as in the 70 C and 90 C runs. To nd the steady state ux for the high temperature level a larger inlet tank making a longer running time possible would be needed. The pilot plant used during these experiments is unfortunately not suitable for that kind of long time steady state experiments but the results give us an indication of what we can expect. The ux at 110 C should stabilize somewhere over 100 L h1 m2, which is the stabilized ux measured at 90 C. 190 L h1 m2 is one of lowest ux recorded in the batches at 110 C and is used in the upcoming calculations as the assumed ux for the membrane during a longer period in operation at 110 C. Steady state uxes are needed to further pinpoint a stable ux for this application. The reduction of DM in the process water is an essential measure for the possibility to increase the efciency of the entire plant. The pre-processing step is one of the main bottlenecks of the plant and improvements made here can have large effects on the total biogas production of the plant. Table 2 shows the separation efciency in the different tests. The variation in the DM content from the start to the end of the ltration process was small and the DM content of the permeate is based on a mean value of the three samples taken during the ltration. The reduction of DM in the process water shown here indicates that the use of the membrane lters allows the possibility of increasing the intake of organic matter into the process by almost 29% (using Eq. (4) and DMbiowaste of 31.4%, the mean DM content based on statistical data from the Vxtkraft plant). The membrane lter operation temperature does not only affect the ow or ux over the membrane lterit also has an effect on the DM content itself. The previous study has shown that operation temperatures close to 120 C produce a higher DM content of

m biowaste DM biowaste Turbomixers

mslurry DM slurry

Digester

Centrifuges

Solid fertilizer

m decantate DM decantate

m concentrate m permeate DMpermeate DMconcentrate Membrane filter

Fig. 2. A simplied process map of the biogas plant with the membrane ltration unit installed.

J. Lindmark et al. / Desalination 267 (2011) 160169 Table 1 Maximum ux values during the experiments. Test 1 2 3 4 5 6 7a
a

165

Temp 110116 112114 110113 92101 94104 7684 112116

Maximum ux (L h1 m2) 345 464 464 189 189 113 292

Carried out as a follow up experiment after test 6 at the lowest temperature interval.

approximately 1.92.1% [14], which counteracts the aim of the installation. This is probably due to increased solubility or thermal hydrolysis of the organic material at higher temperatures. Similar results have been seen in other processes where high temperatures have been used [13]. Unfortunately, the temperature could not be recorded more accurately in these experiments because of a malfunctioning temperature sensor. A more detailed examination of the correlation between elevated DM content and temperature can therefore not be made from these data. Although there is a decrease in the total DM content in the process water, there is still a build up of smaller molecules. The ltration process does not remove sugars, amino acids, salts and other small molecules which will recirculate with the process water and can lead to problems as their concentrations rise. This problem is not caused by the lter, but it may be part of the solution as a pre-treatment stage before ion exchange or reverse osmosis [21]. The conguration of the membrane pilot plant is not suitable for determination of the long term performance of the membrane lter or the effects that the increased fouling may have on the capacity of the membrane. These limitations are due to the limited tank size of the inlet/feed tank, which does not have the possibility of connecting to a larger container. When recirculating the same liquid over and over again through the membrane it is likely that the substances in the process water can break down or react due to the high temperature at which the membrane operates. The ltration procedure lasted between 30 min and 1 h 30 min depending on how long the internal circulation was running. The temperature of the membrane was not stable and changed slowly during the ltrations and may have obscured any loss of ux over the membrane. 3.2. Energy use and production capacity In a full scale membrane installation the efciency of the separation and the increased capacity of the plant must be balanced against the energy and heat requirements of the process. A lower DM content would mean an increased capacity to add organic material to the process and an increased biogas production at the plant. The increase of biogas produced must be compared with the cost of the installation, the maintenance and the running costs. Because of the heat requirements of this process, it is of the upmost importance that heat is recovered from the process and reused to heat incoming process water. The ux over the membrane is also affected by the pressure and can be optimized [13], but the capacity of the UF plant depends more on the product and the temperature than on the pressure, and most UF-lters only have a maximum useful pressure of around 300 to 500 kPa [2]. The capacity increase that the membrane installation can facilitate can be used to reduce the amount of water required by the process and/or to increase the amount of organic waste going in to the system, depending on the DM content of the process water. Fig. 4(a) shows how the water requirement changes with the DM content of the process water if no change is made to the amount of organic waste (Eq. (5)). Fig. 4(b) on the other hand shows the capability to add more organics to the system if the DM content of the process water

decreases and no change is made to the ow of process water (Eq. (4)). The size and cost of a full size membrane installation at the plant are of course inuenced by the volume of process water that needs to be treated but the increase in organic waste also leads to more biogas and higher revenues from the plant. Increasing the output and revenues from the plant are high priorities, but the water consumption may be lowered instead if there is a shortage of organic material. The amount of process water recovered from the centrifuges varies with the DM content of the digestate. Presently, the two centrifuges at the Vxtkraft plant recover a maximum of around 250 m3 of process water every day, which also puts constraints on the process, and has a large impact on the usage of a membrane ltration unit. Some of the

500 450 400

Flux at 70C

Flux (L h-1 m-2)

350 300 250 200 150 100 50 0 5 10 15 20 25

Time during permeate withdrawal (min)

500 450 400

Flux at 90C

Flux (L h-1 m-2)

350 300 250 200 150 100 50 0 10 20 30

Time during permeate withdrawal (min)

500 450 400

Flux at 110C

Flux (L h-1 m-2)

350 300 250 200 150 100 50 0 5 10 15

Time during permeate withdrawal (min)

Fig. 3. Flux of permeate through the membrane at three different temperature levels. Filtration curves for test 6 at a temperature of 70 C (a), for test 4 at 90 C (b) and for test 3 at 110 C (c).

166 Table 2 DM content before and after ltration. Test Temp DM (%) Process water 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 110116 112114 110113 92101 94104 7684 112116 3.97 3.93 4.13 4.09 4.16 4.29 4.39 Permeate 1.63 1.62 1.63 1.55 1.52 1.60 1.66

J. Lindmark et al. / Desalination 267 (2011) 160169 Table 3 Capacity increase at different DM contents of the rejected concentrate when looking at the process water supply during one day. DM (%) concentrate 11 12 13 14 Increased amount of organic waste (ton) 3.2 5.7 7.8 9.6 Capacity increase (%) 5 8 11 14

Concentrate 8.43 10.63 10.29 5.46 6.46 6.52

DM reduction in the permeate (%) 59 59 61 62 63 63 62

liquid will be lost during the membrane ltration so there will not be the same amount available. The results from the experiments can only give an idea of how much water can be recovered because it was the low water level in the inlet tank and its effect on the pump that ended each experiment. The possibility of adding 29% more organic waste was calculated from the capacity increase that is possible in the pretreatment step without looking at the present limitation of process water. When considering the supply of the process water in relation to the DM content of the concentrate that will be rejected after the membrane ltration and the DM content of the permeate, the capacity increase of the pre-treatment can be calculated (Eqs. (6) and (4)). Table 3 shows how the capacity to add new organic waste varies with the DM content of the concentrate. Higher DM content means that less water is lost from the process and more water can therefore be

a
Process water demand (m3 h-1)

34

Water demand
32 30 28 26 24 22 4.5%

3.5%

2.5%

1.5%

Dry matter content of the process water

b
Capacity to pre-process waste (ton h-1)

15

Capacity to process the organics

14 13 12 11 10 9 8 4.5%

recirculated. A DM content in the concentrate of around 1114% is a reasonable result according to previous experiments [14]. A DM content of 14% in the concentrate from the ltration results in about 20% of the process water being lost during ltration. It is likely that the total DM content of the digester suspension will decrease and the amount of process water available in the future will increase if a membrane lter is installed. The amount of process water that needs to be treated by membrane ltration is not an obvious choice and must be decided in conjunction with a DM content that is acceptable for the process water in the long run as well as the capital and operational costs of the selected installation. It is not known how the DM content in the feed to the membrane will change, and further studies are needed to be able to determine whether an equilibrium can be reached and maintained. It is expensive to build an installation to treat the entire ow and it is pointless to oversize it if the DM in the feed decreases after a few weeks and the equipment is put out of use. The goal should be to build an installation that is of sufcient size to maintain the DM content in the process water at a certain level. The capacity increase is dependent on the amount of the process water that is ltered. If all the available water is ltered there is a capacity increase of 14% (Table 3). The DM content of the decantate from the centrifuges is likely to decrease through continued ltering, thus increasing the amount of available process water. With time, the capacity may therefore increase up to 29%. The process water is at 37 C and its temperature has to be increased by means of heat exchangers before ltration. Eq. (1) was used to analyse the extra power needed to heat the water, with the assumption that counter current heat exchangers with a temperature difference of 5 were used for heat recovery [14]. The total energy requirement of the installation is the sum of the heating energy and the pumping energy, and varies with the ow to the membrane and the ux. The power needed for the pumps in a full scale membrane ltration process is dependent on the number of membrane units, which is determined from Eqs. (6) and (8). Each membrane unit requires 22 kW of pumping power. Table 4 shows the results of these calculations. Energy readings were taken during the experiments but there was no substantial increase in pump energy even when pumping a liquid with a DM content of 11%. If the ow to the membrane is xed the ux can be optimized to reduce the number of membranes required, thereby also reducing the energy requirements. A temperature of 90 C and a ux of 100 L h1 m2 requires 7 to 20 units, whereas a temperature of 110 C, and a ux of 190 L h1 m2 only requires between 4 and 11 UF units (Table 4). The number of
Table 4 Total energy requirement of the membrane unit at different temperatures and at different ows. Case Flow [m3 h1] Number of UF units 110 C 1 2 3 4 10 20 26 32 4 7 9 11 90 C 7 13 17 20 Pump power demand [kW] 110 C 88 154 198 242 90 C 154 286 374 440 Extra heat power needed [kW] 110 C 58 117 152 187 90 C 58 117 152 187 Total power demand [kW] 110 C 146 271 350 429 90 C 212 403 526 627

3.5%

2.5%

1.5%

Dry matter content of the process water

Fig. 4. The graphs show the effect that different DM contents of the process water can have on the process. The increase in capacity can be used to reduce the water requirement (a) or to increase the amount of organic waste added to the system (b).

J. Lindmark et al. / Desalination 267 (2011) 160169 Table 5 Increase in methane production after ltration and the corresponding energy content. Case Increase in methane production [m3 s1] 30% 1 2 3 4 0.016 0.032 0.041 0.051 44% 0.011 0.022 0.028 0.035 Power [kW] 30% 570 1140 1482 1824 44% 389 777 1011 1244

167

membranes used is calculated from Eq. (8).The lowest temperature at 70 C showed the lowest ux values and that makes it the least interesting temperature for this application and is therefore left out of the following analyzes. The increase in methane production and the corresponding energy content are shown in Table 5. Lowering the percentage of DM from 4.15 to 1.6% results in a theoretical increase in methane production (Eq. (2)). The biogas production used in this study was determined from tests done on samples from the Vxtkraft plant [19]. However, the DM content of the organic waste used in those test varied between 30 and 44%. Because of this we have an uncertainty in the gas produced per DM of the biowaste. This uncertainty has been taken into account in this study by making calculations for a lower and upper limit of the DM content of the biowaste (30% and 44% respectively) giving the biogas production of 82 m3 of methane per ton of wet substrate as given in [19]. The energy content of the produced methane can be calculated using the methane heating value of 10 kWh m3. Comparison of the total power requirement in Table 4 and the power of the increased methane production in Table 5 shows that the energy balance is satised.

3.3. Economic evaluation In this study, the cost is only estimated for the case with an operating temperature of 110 C because the large number of membrane units needed to operate at 90 C makes operating at this temperature not economically viable (see Table 4), as the membrane is the most expensive component of the system. Table 6 shows estimations of both the capital costs and the operational costs for the four different ow cases, in thousands of Euros (t ), with the energy cost set to 0.054 per kWh. Operational costs have been given as a range because there are still many uncertainties regarding the lifespan of the membrane and the amount and cost of the cleaning chemicals. The annual operational cost is estimated to be between 6.5 and 10% of the capital cost. Fig. 5 illustrates how the operational costs in cases 1 and 4 are distributed on the different cost items. The effect of the installation size on the distribution of operational costs can be analysed by comparing the different cases. The energy requirement of the plant makes up between 30 and 50% of the total operational cost. The energy requirement for heating the process water is around 40% of the total energy requirement and accounts for between 10 and 20% of the total operational costs. Maintenance costs are proportional to the membrane units size. The chemical costs are the same for the different membrane sizes but make up a decreasing fraction of the

total operational cost as the installation size increases. The type and amount of chemicals needed for cleaning needs to be examined further to increase the cost efciency, particularly for smaller membranes. The cost of cleaning does not change much with increasing membrane size in the range presented here, but the energy requirement and the number of membranes that need to be exchanged increase with increasing membrane size, driving up the total costs. It is important to note that both the operational and capital costs for case 4 are more than double those for case 1 (Table 6). The economic value of the methane produced differs according to its application. The biogas from Vxtkraft is sold as fuel for vehicles for 0.825 /N m3 with a purity above 97%. The concentrate from the membrane can be used as an organic fertilizer but is not added to the calculations as an income because the total amount of fertilizer sold from Vxtkraft would not be affected by the installation. Table 7 shows the economic value of the additional biogas produced, the cost of building and maintaining the installation (assuming an economical lifetime of 15 years) and the estimated prot of the installation. The revenue remains dependent on the biogas production per DM content of the biowaste (DM content between 30 and 44% for production of 82 m3 of methane per ton of wet substrate) because this can add valuable water to the system and this is therefore added as a factor in these calculations. The potential revenues from this installation are closely related to the amount of water that is available and in this estimate 20% of the process water is lost with the concentrate (14% DM). Table 7 shows that a prot can indeed be made from this type of installation and that the prot increases with the size of the UF unit because of the increased methane production it leads too. However, the prot is very dependent on the DM content of the incoming material and how well the process is tuned against this parameter. When using the biogas as fuel for vehicles the capacity of the gas upgrading facility also needs to be taken into account so that all the produced biogas can be converted to the required 97% methane content. Another important area that needs to be investigated further is the supply of substrate, to ensure that there is enough fresh organic material to maximise the use of the increase in processing capacity. 4. Conclusions The ux of ltered process water from a membrane ltration unit in a biogas plant increases with temperature. The energy balance of the system also becomes increasingly favourable with rising temperature. This is true as long as the DM content in the permeate does not increase because of induced solubility or thermal hydrolysis, which occurs at around 120 C. In the temperature interval around 70 110 C the permeate had a DM content with a mean value of 1.6%. The energy needed to heat the membrane when using heat recovery is low compared to the energy produced by the additional methane produced by the process. The ux at 70 C and 90 C is between 60 70 L h1 m 2 and 90100 L h1 m2 respectively. The ux over the membrane at 110 C reaches up to a maximum of 464 L h1 m2. The ux should stabilize somewhere in the interval 100 190 L h 1 m 2, which is the ow between 90 C and a reoccurring lowest ow in many of the batch experiments at 110 C.

Table 6 The capital cost and annual operational cost of a membrane installation used at 110 C (260 operating days annually) in thousands of Euros [t ]. Case Capital cost [t ] Energy demand [t ] Maintenance [t ] Chemical cleaning [t ] Min 1 2 3 4 581 931 1173 1424 16 30 39 48 3 4 4 5 7 7 7 7 Max 14 14 14 14 UF replacement [t ] Min 12 21 27 33 Max 24 42 54 66 Total operational costs [t ] Min 38 62 78 93 Max 57 90 112 133

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J. Lindmark et al. / Desalination 267 (2011) 160169

Fig. 5. The minimum (a) and maximum (b) operational costs of case 1 and the minimum (c) and maximum (d) operational costs of case 4.

Steady state uxes are needed to further pinpoint the stable ux for this application at 110 C. The membrane unit has the potential to increase the capacity of the plant by 13% from the day of installation if all the process water is ltered and can increase the capacity by up to 29% over a longer period. The results from the economic analysis show that this type of installation can be protable. The prot is dependent on the availability of the process water, the lifespan of the membranes and the biogas production per DM content of the new biowaste. The results show a prot between 70,000 and 2 million when the biogas production is 82 m3 of methane per ton wet substrate for a biowaste with the DM content at 30%. With the same biogas production at 44% DM content the economic balance is spanning from a negative result of 410,000 to a positive result of 470,000 . The lifespan of the membranes and the impact of fouling in this type of application needs to be studied further in prolonged experiments. Further studies on the composition of the ballast in the process water and the mass balance of these substances are required to determine the optimal size of the membrane ltration unit that could be installed at the Vxtkraft biogas plant.

Acknowledgement This study is funded by the Knowledge Foundation as part of the BioGasOpt project. References
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Table 7 Yearly revenues and costs of a membrane installation, the capital cost spread over a 15 year period, and the nal prot after the 15 years. Case Revenues [t /year] Costs [t /year] min 77 124 156 188 max 96 152 190 228 Prot after 15 years[t ] Min 30% 355 1159 1591 2013 44% 126 198 341 474 max 30% 68 738 1080 1411 44% 413 224 171 128

30% 1 2 3 4 101 202 262 322

44% 69 137 179 220

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[18] Y.A. engel, R.H. Turner, Fundamentals of ThermalFluid Sciences, McGraw-Hill International Edition, 2001. [19] P. Weiland, and T. Ahrens, Demonstration of an optimized production system for biogas from biological waste and agricultural feedstock, EU-project NNE5/2000/484, AGROPTI-Gas, Final Report, Deliverable 18, Report from the biological evaluation, (2006). [20] G. Owen, M. Bandi, J.A. Howell, S.J. Churchouse, Economic assessment of membrane process for water and waste water treatment, J. Membr. Sci. 102 (1995) 7791. [21] R. Hardiman, O. Chu, J. Greene, D. Libby, C. Weber, R. Cross, Evaluation of spiralwound ultraltration cartridges for large-scale water applications, Bioken Separations Inc. Report, AWWA, 1991, pp. 18.