Reverse Osmosis

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Almost all naturally occurring water contains dissolved organic and inorganic salts and minerals, such as sodium, calcium, magnesium, iron, chlorides, sulfates, nitrates, carbonates and bicarbonates, amongst others. This water may also contain high and low molecular weight organic compounds due to decayed organic matters or manmade pollutants. When high levels of these types are found, the feed water may be rendered undrinkable or unusable for your particular application.

Reverse Osmosis (RO) employs a semi-permeable membrane that allows water molecules to pass through, while rejecting larger molecules.  Water which enters the RO system is separated into two streams:  pure product water (permeate) and salty water containing unwanted compounds (concentrate).  The permeate is virtually free of all organics and typically contains less than ten (10) % of the dissolved minerals originally present.

Nanofiltration (NF) operates essentially the same as RO except that the membrane allows more of the dissolved solids to pass through.  NF membranes also operate at lower pressure than RO membranes.  Applications where final water quality is not as critical, feed water pressure must be minimized, or where there is a desire to pass more minerals (as in some drinking water applications), then may be the correct technology.

The design of an RO system must be carefully looked at for each application.  Although RO is a proven technology, the system's design is key to reliable long term operation.  The level of instrumentation & control, pump sizing & selection, redundancy considerations, and of course membrane selection are all critical.  Additionally, the design must be “operator friendly”, and this design consideration is often overlooked.

ENAQUA has the design, fabrication and operational experience to provide our customers with high quality systems.  Our ENPURE™ systems are custom designed for each specific application as opposed to trying to make an “off the shelf” system work.  We strive to work closely will our customers to fully understand their requirements and ensure that the ENPURE™ system we build will fully meet the needs for the long term.

Our experience is broad based, with numerous references in the following applications:

• Brackish water desalination
• Seawater desalination
• Potable water production
• Boiler feed water
• Industrial and municipal wastewater recovery
• Irrigation water production