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Increasing water demands and more stringent US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regulations prompted Upper Trinity RegionalWater District (UTRWD) north of Dallas, Texas to pursue membrane technology for anupcoming district expansion. State regulatory guidelines require testing at the pilot scale levelbefore state approval of a membrane process and maximum design operating flux (i.e., plantcapacity). Such requirements become obvious when considering the wide variability in waterquality for surface waters; each source has its own peculiarities.Fluctuations in raw water quality not only pose a threat to the potential breakdown in thetreatment process, but require operator input to react to changing conditions. The ability toautomate and remotely control/operate membrane processes was one of the motivations behindconsideration of membrane technology. Seasonal and daily fluctuations observed in this studyincluded: taste and odor compounds, turbidity, total organic carbon (TOC), temperature, andFe/Mn concentrations. Raw water quality fluctuations ranged from moderate (65% increase inaverage total organic carbon) to excessive (292% increase in average turbidity).Pretreatment with ferric sulfate coagulation was immediately followed by membrane filtration.Three membrane units, Hydranautics, Pall Corporation, and Zenon Environmental were testedfrom September 2001 to April 2002. With optimized coagulant dose, flux, and backwashparameters, membrane filtration was shown to be a viable option. Initial plant size for the fullscaleinstallation will be 11-mgd, expandable to 30-mgd in 10 years. Includes 6 references, tables, figures.

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Edition: Vol. - No. Published: 03/05/2003 Number of Pages: 13File Size: 1 file , 570 KB