Analysis and Simulation Performance of a Reverse Osmosis Plant in the Al-Maqal Port

Abstract

The Basrah province (southern of Iraq) was interested in establishing desalination plants to provide drinking water due to the high levels of salinity in its water resources. This work was carried out in order to evaluate and simulate the functionality of the reverse osmosis plant in the Al-Maqal port. From the field and laboratory measurement, this study concluded that the considered parameters of product water by reverse osmosis (RO) plant were within the Iraqi standard (IRS) limits. The calculation of operation indices showed that the recovery rate of plant (72%) and the permeate flux of plant (20 lmh) was within for limitation of brackish surface water. In turn, the plant has a low salt rejection (90.1%) and a high pressure drop (5 bar); therefore, the membranes require backwashing or chemical cleaning. Then, the performance of RO membrane was simulated by the Winflows software. The best operating parameters were identified. The coefficient of determination (R2) between simulated and measured TDS was 0.83. Therefore, the simulated TDS of permeate multiplied by 5.3 was given a good estimation for actual TDS within acceptable an error rate of 17%.