Investigation of membrane fouling during cross-flow filtration of wood components

Research Project, 2019 – 2023

The development of efficient separation processes is crucial for the realisation of the biorefinery concept, which is important to enable the substitution of fossil raw materials for the production of materials and chemicals. Membrane filtration, as a pressure-driven operation, will play an important role during the development of biorefinery processes. However, one of the biggest challenges when using membranes for separation is fouling. Membrane fouling problems can be expected to be very severe for the streams in the biorefinery. This project investigates how fouling deposits are formed and affected by particle-particle and particle-membrane interactions as well as by process conditions during microfiltration of small lignin and cellulose particles.

Wallenberg Wood Science Center (WWSC) is a research center funded by the Knut and Alice Wallenberg Foundation which focuses on new materials from trees. It is a multidisciplinary collaboration between Chalmers, KTH and Linköping University striving for scientific excellence. The mission is to create knowledge and build competence that can form as the basis for innovative future value creation from forest raw material.