CFD Modeling for velocity and pressure distribution in a flat membrane module

Pressure driven membrane filtration processes have been widely used in many separation and purification technologies. It is necessary to have a rigorous knowledge about the hydrodynamics and mass transfer conditions inside the channels. Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) has been used to model fluid dynamics in complex geometries and consider the concentration polarization effect. This paper reports Computational Fluid Dynamics(CFD) on cross flow microfiltration membrane for a flat membrane in a rectangular channel. A generic CFD model has been developed which describes the pressure and velocitydistribution across the membrane surface. A two-dimensional microfiltration membrane with permeable walls in Cartesian system was considered and the porous media approach was used to calculate the velocity across the membrane. The local pressure and velocities would beused to calculate the shear stress and the total force on the membrane surface. These parameters are related to the mass transfer equations and the permeate flux could be predicted.

Keywords:

membrane , microfiltration , CFD , modeling