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Licensed Unlicensed Requires Authentication Published by De Gruyter January 8, 2016

Experimental Study and Numerical Simulation of the Air Gap Membrane Distillation (AGMD) Process

  • Ehsan Karbasi , Javad Karimi-Sabet ORCID logo EMAIL logo , J. Mohammadi Roshandeh , M. A. Moosavian and H. Ahadi

Abstract

Some challenges, including inappropriate distribution of currents on the membrane surface, poor hydrodynamics and existing severe temperature polarization (TP) phenomenon in MD modules, impede industrialization of MD process. Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) method was used for numerical simulation of hydrodynamics in air gap membrane distillation modules. One of two simulated modules in this work is a novel developed one in which heat and mass transfer data was compared with available literature data. Moreover, the effect of using baffles in module was investigated. Comparison between the novel module and conventional module indicates higher trans-membrane mass flux and gained output ratio (GOR) coefficient by 7% and 15%, respectively. Moreover, the effects of different operating conditions including feed temperatures and feed flow rates on permeate flux were investigated.

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Received: 2015-12-8
Accepted: 2015-12-10
Published Online: 2016-1-8
Published in Print: 2016-3-1

©2016 by De Gruyter

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