Applications and Advancements in Treatment of Waste Water by Membrane Technology- A Review

Removal of various pollutants from waste water can be facilitiated by various methods. Conventional treatment methods include physical treatment followed by biological treatments , either attached growth or suspended growth. These methods have their own disadvantages like large land area requirements, disposal of the sludge produced in the treatments, operating problems under various conditions of temperature. Membrane technology is very promising and widely studied alternative. The current review aims at studying the research carried out for application of membrane technology for the wastewater treatment. During the review it was found that the membrane technologies such as electro dialysis, membrane bioreactors, anaerobic membrane bioreactors, reverse osmosis, ultrafiltration, microfiltration, nanofiltration etc. can be used effectively for wastewater treatment. High efficiency and low area requirement, compactness are key features of this technology. This technology can be combined with conventional aerobic and anaerobic treatment facilities to increase the effectiveness. Membrane technology is the most important method in achieving the objective of reuse of wastewater in an era of water scarcity in many parts of the world.