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SEPARATION METHODS FOR ENVIRONMENTAL TECHNOLOGIES - SPECIAL ISSUE: MEMBRANES AND ENVIRONMENTAL APPLICATIONS
Citation:
Sikdar*, S K., J Burckle*, AND I. Rogut**. SEPARATION METHODS FOR ENVIRONMENTAL TECHNOLOGIES - SPECIAL ISSUE: MEMBRANES AND ENVIRONMENTAL APPLICATIONS. Bennett, G.F. (ed.), Environmental Progress & Sustainable Energy. American Society of Chemical Engineering (AIChE), New York, NY, 20(1):1-11, (2001).
Description:
Much of the environmental damage in air, soil, sediment, surface and groundwater can be repaired, and much prevention of further damage achieved through the use of efficient separation technologies. Most environmental challenges arise because of dispersion of harmful pollutants from point sources into the environment. Preventing this dilution into air, water, soil, and sediment calls for better control technologies, and for cleaner technologies. In industries that process and convert chemicals and materials, more efficient separation technologies are needed. Such technologies should typically achieve higher degrees of species separation. On the other hand, environmental contamination that has already occurred requires for its remediation separation technologies that are especially suited for very low concentration. Two of the major pollutant problems highlighted are the separation and recovery of volatile organic compounds and toxic metal species. For this purpose conventional separation technologies mostly cannot be made efficient enough to satisfy cost constraints. In this paper, the scope of separation science and technologies in environmental areas will be outlined, and several emerging ideas in the areas of sorption and membranes that look promising are discussed. The authors view high surface area membranes that look promising are discussed. The authors view high surface area membrane-based sorption as a common approach that shows significant promise for tackling these difficult problems by improving technical capability, operability, and process economics.