Hollow fiber is one of the most popular membranes used in industries. It is because of its several beneficial features that make it attractive for those industries. Among them are :
- Modest energy requirement :
In hollow fiber filtration process, no phase change is involved. Consequently, need no latent heat. This makes the hollow fiber membrane have the potential to replace some unit operation which consume heat, such as distillation or evaporation column.
Since the basic principal of hollow fiber is filtration, it does not create any waste from its operation except the unwanted component in the feed stream. This can help to decrease the cost of operation to handle the waste.
- Large surface per unit volume:
Hollow fiber has large membrane surface per module volume. Hence, the size of hollow fiber is smaller than other type of membrane but can give higher performance.
Hollow fiber is a flexible membrane, it can carry out the filtration by 2 ways, either is “inside-out” or “outside-in”.
Hollow fiber need low operation cost compare to other types of unit operation.
Hollow fiber membranes have been widely in the industries for a wide range of applications. Some of the common applications are:
- Surface Water Treatment such as for Rural & Municipal
- Ground Water Treatment
- Industrial Water Treatment
- Industrial Water Re-use
- Oily Water treatment
- Food & Beverage
- Membrane Bioreactor
- Gas Separation & purification
- Pretreatment for RO or other membrane systems
