Non-Isothermal Treatment of Oily Waters Using Ceramic Membrane: A Numerical Investigation

Currently, the oil industry deals with the challenge of produced-water proper disposal, and the membrane-separation technology appears as an important tool on the treatment of these waters. In this sense, this work developed a mathematical model for simulating the oil/water separation by a ceramic membrane. The aim was to investigate the thermal aspects of the separation process via computational fluid dynamic, using the Ansys CFX® 15 software (15, Ansys, Inc., Canonsburg, PA, USA). Oil concentration, pressure, and velocity distributions, as well as permeation velocity, are presented and analyzed. It was verified that the mathematical model was capable of accurately representing the studied phenomena and that temperature strongly influences the flow behavior.