TY - JOUR
T1 - Recent developments in forward osmosis
T2 - Opportunities and challenges
AU - Zhao, Shuaifei
AU - Zou, Linda
AU - Tang, Chuyang Y.
AU - Mulcahy, Dennis
N1 - Funding Information:
The authors thank China Scholarship Council (CSC) and the University of South Australia for providing the PhD scholarships to Shuaifei Zhao.
PY - 2012/4/1
Y1 - 2012/4/1
N2 - Recently, forward osmosis (FO) has attracted growing attention in many potential applications such as power generation, desalination, wastewater treatment and food processing. However, there are still several critical challenges, including concentration polarization, membrane fouling, reverse solute diffusion and the need for new membrane development and draw solute design in FO. These challenges are also the current research focus on FO. This paper aims to review the recent developments in FO, focusing on the opportunities and challenges. It begins with discussing the advantages of the FO process over pressure-driven membrane processes. These potential advantages lie in FO's low energy consumption, low fouling propensity, reduced or easy cleaning, low costs, high salt rejection and high water flux. Next, the recent applications of FO, as the outcomes of the above advantages, are described. The key part of this review is a detailed discussion of five critical challenges faced by FO and their relationships. Finally, the future of FO is viewed. This review provides a clear outline for FO-concerned researchers on the recent developments in FO.
AB - Recently, forward osmosis (FO) has attracted growing attention in many potential applications such as power generation, desalination, wastewater treatment and food processing. However, there are still several critical challenges, including concentration polarization, membrane fouling, reverse solute diffusion and the need for new membrane development and draw solute design in FO. These challenges are also the current research focus on FO. This paper aims to review the recent developments in FO, focusing on the opportunities and challenges. It begins with discussing the advantages of the FO process over pressure-driven membrane processes. These potential advantages lie in FO's low energy consumption, low fouling propensity, reduced or easy cleaning, low costs, high salt rejection and high water flux. Next, the recent applications of FO, as the outcomes of the above advantages, are described. The key part of this review is a detailed discussion of five critical challenges faced by FO and their relationships. Finally, the future of FO is viewed. This review provides a clear outline for FO-concerned researchers on the recent developments in FO.
KW - Concentration polarization
KW - Desalination
KW - Forward osmosis
KW - Power generation
KW - Wastewater treatment
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84857046229&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.memsci.2011.12.023
DO - 10.1016/j.memsci.2011.12.023
M3 - Review article
AN - SCOPUS:84857046229
SN - 0376-7388
VL - 396
SP - 1
EP - 21
JO - Journal of Membrane Science
JF - Journal of Membrane Science
ER -
