Reverse Osmosis
Protect your customers’ reverse osmosis systems from scaling and biofouling

Fresh water purification, food liquids processing, desalination or wastewater recovery, and industrial water purification processes are increasingly based on the use of reverse osmosis (RO) membranes. Such important investments necessitate meticulous care to prevent operational issues, including scaling and biofouling. Deposits on membranes can reduce permeate flow and increase pressure drop, significantly reducing permeate yield.

Biofouling Prevention

Biofouling can affect the operation of RO membranes requiring operators to temporarily stop water production to remove and clean the membranes. Not only is the down time costly, but the frequent cleaning can potentially lead to shorter membrane life. An effective membrane biofouling management program should include both contamination control and cleaning procedures to optimize operations and water reliability. Dow’s reverse osmosis antifouling microbiocides protect RO systems from microbiological fouling so they can supply the quantity and quality of water required.

Scaling Prevention

Feed water can be from different sources and contain different contaminants such as suspended solids and dissolved salts. Pretreatment focuses mainly on the removal of suspended solids while in RO systems salts can precipitate out due to supersaturation.
Dow ACUMER™ antiscalants can be used to inhibit this precipitation, enabling the system to work at a higher recovery rate. Adding just a small concentration of ACUMER™ polymers to the feed water increases the recovery due to multiple scale formation inhibiting mechanisms and aids by keeping the RO membranes cleaner and free of deposits. This, in turn, reduces water use, maintenance time and extends membrane life.

Dow ACUMER™ portfolio for RO: