The expansion of technology motivates the increase of global demands for critical minerals. In this context, the exploration of secondary sources of these components is expanding. End-of-life batteries can be seen as potential sources of lithium, cobalt, nickel and manganese for electric vehicles or diverse applications in electronic equipments.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe extracellular degradation of antibiotics facilitated by bio-nanoparticles is significant in the field of waste valorization. Among different bio-nanoparticles, bio-FeS nanoparticles stand out for their convenient and cost-effective synthesis. Nevertheless, there is a lack of understanding regarding the extracellular degradation of pollutants driven by bio-FeS nanoparticles.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe deposition of fats, oil, and grease (FOG) in sewers reduces conveyance capacity and leads to sanitary sewer overflows. The major contributing factor lies in the indiscriminate disposal of used cooking oil (UCO) via kitchen sinks. While prior investigations have mostly highlighted the significance of Ca from concrete biocorrosion, the influence of common metal ions (e.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThis study investigates the eco-friendly extraction of metal oxides from LCO and NMC batteries using supercritical water. Experiments were conducted at 450 °C with a feed rate of 5 mL min and varying battery/PVC ratios (0.0, 2.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFUrbanization and economic development cause water pollution in the inner-city canals and rivers globally. Bung Xang canal in Can Tho city of Vietnam is facing problems with water pollution due to the lack of centralized wastewater treatment plants and low public awareness on environmental protection. Perception of local residents was collected using structured questionnaires including both qualitative and quantitative information.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe increasing global demand for fatty products, population growth, and the expansion of food service establishments (FSEs) present significant challenges for the wastewater industry. This is often due to the build-up of fat, oil and grease (FOG) in sewers, which reduces capacity and leads to sanitary sewer overflows. It is crucial to develop economic and sustainable in-sewer FOG management techniques to minimise maintenance costs and service disruptions caused by the removal of FOG deposits from sewers.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAs a long-standing problem, electrodialysis (ED) clogging is believed a consequence of colloids. However, its blocking causation and clogging mechanism have not been verified. In this study, electrodialysis was used to treat a colloidal saline solution, aiming to answer the question from the "nature" of ED by investigating the influence of ED parameters such as laminar flow, salt concentration, current density and pH on colloid geometry and dynamics during the desalting process.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Latarjet has become an increasingly popular treatment option for recurrent anterior shoulder instability. With the reported complication rates for primary Latarjet surgery, there are concerns about the complications of Latarjet as a revision surgery. It remains unclear if poor results after previous surgical management can be improved with revision Latarjet as well as with primary Latarjet.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe environment has been significantly impacted by the rubber industry through the release of large quantities of wastewater during various industrial processes. Therefore, it is crucial to treat the wastewater from the rubber industry before discharging it into natural water bodies. With the understanding that alarmingly depleting freshwater sources need to be preserved for future generations, this paper reviews the status of the rubber industry and the pollution caused by them, focusing mainly on water pollution.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMembrane distillation crystallization (MDC) is an emerging hybrid thermal membrane technology that synergizes membrane distillation (MD) and crystallization, which can achieve both freshwater and minerals recovery from high concentrated solutions. Due to the outstanding hydrophobic nature of the membranes, MDC has been widely used in numerous fields such as seawater desalination, valuable minerals recovery, industrial wastewater treatment and pharmaceutical applications, where the separation of dissolved solids is required. Despite the fact that MDC has shown great promise in producing both high-purity crystals and freshwater, most studies on MDC remain limited to laboratory scale, and industrializing MDC processes is currently impractical.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe improper handling of electronic waste has not only severe environmental impacts but also results in the loss of high economic potential. To address this issue, the use of supercritical water (ScW) technology for the eco-friendly processing of waste printed circuit boards (WPCBs) obtained from obsolete mobile phones has been explored in this study. The WPCBs were characterized via MP-AES, WDXRF, TG/DTA, CHNS elemental analysis, SEM and XRD.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFEnviron Sci Pollut Res Int
September 2023
Modelling the removal of monovalent and divalent ions from seawater via nanofiltration is crucial for pre-treatment in seawater reverse osmosis systems. Effective separation of divalent ions through nanofiltration and allowing the permeate containing only monovalent ions to pass through the reverse osmosis system produces pure NaCl salt from the concentrate. However, the Donnan steric pore model and dielectric exclusion assume a uniformly distributed cylinder pore morphology, which is not representative of the actual membrane structure.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFHypothesis: Reverse shoulder arthroplasty (RSA) has become an increasingly popular treatment option for proximal humerus fractures in the elderly. There is however contradictory evidence on the impact of timing of RSA on patient outcomes. It remains unclear if poor results after initial nonsurgical or surgical management can be improved with delayed RSA.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFOne of the most broadly used models for membrane fouling is the Hermia model (HM), which separates this phenomenon into four blocking mechanisms, each with an associated parameter n. The original model is given by an Ordinary Differential Equation (ODE) dependent on n. This ODE is solved only for these four values of n, which limits the effectiveness of the model when adjusted to experimental data.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMatured landfill leachate is complex in nature, hence, a single conventional treatment unit is insufficient to remove the contaminants of the leachate to achieve the discharge standards. Furthermore, high levels of organic matter, colour compounds, and iron-based materials form a dark black/brown colour in leachate which is not removed by the biological treatment units. Hence, an Anoxic-Oxic Membrane Bioreactor coupled with a tertiary adsorption unit composed of crosslinked-protonated chitosan was tested for effective removal of the colour of the permeate.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFWastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) are key components for the capture of microplastics (MPs) before they are released into natural waterways. Removal efficiencies as high as 99% may be achieved but sub-micron MPs as well as nanoplastics have been overlooked because of analytical limitations. Furthermore, short MP fibres are of concern because of their low capture rate as well as the lack of understanding of their influence on purification system efficiency.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThis study describes the collection of landfill leachate from seven sites in different climatic zones of Sri Lanka and characterizes the landfills through the analyses of leachate quality. Membrane bioreactors (MBRs) with different configurations were employed to treat some of those leachates. An aerobic MBR (AMBR) system was operated in three Phases.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFVarious studies provide information about the high potential of using hollow fiber membrane contactors (HFMCs) for the recovery of dissolved methane from anaerobically treated wastewater effluent and the effects of different operating conditions on their performance. However, majority of those studies evaluated HFMCs at bench scale under favorable conditions, i.e.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFSolid waste Management: There are two articles in this section. Shi et al. (2021) investigated the unbalanced status and multidimensional influences of municipal solid waste management in Africa.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFA mathematical model, which was previously developed for submerged aerobic membrane bioreactors, was successfully applied to elucidate the membrane cake-layer fouling mechanisms due to bound extracellular polymeric substances (eEPS) in a submerged anaerobic membrane bioreactor (SAnMBR). This biofouling dynamic model explains the mechanisms such as attachment, consolidation and detachment of eEPS produced in the bioreactor on the membrane surface. The 4th order Runge-Kutta method was used to solve the model equations, and the parameters were estimated from simulated and experimental results.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFApplications of membranes in water and wastewater treatment, desalination, as well as other purification processes, have become more widespread over the past few decades [...
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