Performance characteristics in forward osmosis desalination modules containing membrane stiffeners

Computational fluid dynamics simulations are conducted on a forward osmosis desalination module consisting of the novel design of stiffener embedded membranes. The porous support layer has a negligible influence on the newly proposed forward osmosis membranes, and its effect of creating the internal concentration polarization is omitted. The design consisting of embedded stiffeners inside the membrane is introduced to mitigate the effect of the external concentration polarization. The embedded stiffeners also work as an added support for the membrane. Net-type stiffeners of 45° and various strand diameters are used for varying flow rates. A benchmark case with a flat membrane is used as a base to assess the performance of the stiffener embedded membrane modules. The laminar model is used for the geometry with the flat membrane, while k–ω SST model is used to characterize the steady-state turbulent structures inside the forward osmosis desalination module containing stiffener embedded membranes. The mathematical model is validated using the existing experimental measurements in the literature. The results indicate that the embedded membrane with D = 0.3 h has alleviated the dilutive and concentrative external concentration polarization substantially and has increased the flux performance of more than 30%.