TY - JOUR
T1 - Experimental Aspects of Scaling Control in Membrane Filtration of Mine Water
AU - Kyllönen, Hanna
AU - Grönroos, Antti
AU - Järvelä, Eliisa
AU - Heikkinen, Juha
AU - Tang, Chuyang
N1 - Funding Information:
The PuMi project studied purification and monitoring concepts for mine water treatment based on new water technologies was carried out as part of the Green Mining programme of the Finnish Funding Agency for Innovation (Tekes). Tekes, VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland Ltd, Outotec, Sofi Filtration, Pöyry, and Liqum are all acknowledged for their financial support of the project.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2016, Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.
PY - 2017/6/1
Y1 - 2017/6/1
N2 - This study focused on membrane filtration of neutralized
pond water, which may be necessary when good quality
water is required for hydrometallurgical processes.
Neutralized mine water can still have fairly high metal
and sulphate levels, which can hinder discharge and reuse
possibilities. Both nanofiltration and reverse osmosis
are effective in removing metals and sulphate, but
scaling can be a severe problem. Microfiltration as a
pre-treatment method, although meant for particle
removal, seemed to decrease the amount of scalants, thus
delayed scaling on the membrane surface and increasing
water recovery for both nanofiltration and reverse
osmosis. It is possible that the presence of particles in
the feed water promoted crystal growth in the turbulent
flow and caused the removal of dissolved constituents.
Alternatively, supersaturation could have occurred,
allowing microfiltration to remove the scalants as
particles. The Liqum sensor indicated that redox values
started to increase again just before scaling began due
to precipitation in the supersaturated membrane
concentrate solution. Thus, the sensor seemed to provide
real time, in-situ, early-stage scaling warning.
AB - This study focused on membrane filtration of neutralized
pond water, which may be necessary when good quality
water is required for hydrometallurgical processes.
Neutralized mine water can still have fairly high metal
and sulphate levels, which can hinder discharge and reuse
possibilities. Both nanofiltration and reverse osmosis
are effective in removing metals and sulphate, but
scaling can be a severe problem. Microfiltration as a
pre-treatment method, although meant for particle
removal, seemed to decrease the amount of scalants, thus
delayed scaling on the membrane surface and increasing
water recovery for both nanofiltration and reverse
osmosis. It is possible that the presence of particles in
the feed water promoted crystal growth in the turbulent
flow and caused the removal of dissolved constituents.
Alternatively, supersaturation could have occurred,
allowing microfiltration to remove the scalants as
particles. The Liqum sensor indicated that redox values
started to increase again just before scaling began due
to precipitation in the supersaturated membrane
concentrate solution. Thus, the sensor seemed to provide
real time, in-situ, early-stage scaling warning.
KW - microfiltration
KW - nanofiltration
KW - neutralizing pond water
KW - real-time measurements
KW - reverse osmosis
KW - scaling
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84988713781&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1007/s10230-016-0415-3
DO - 10.1007/s10230-016-0415-3
M3 - Article
SN - 1025-9112
VL - 36
SP - 193
EP - 198
JO - Mine Water and the Environment
JF - Mine Water and the Environment
IS - 2
ER -