Prediction of the Flux for the Reverse Osmosis of a Solution Containing Sucrose and Glucose

Abstract

To predict the permeate flux value during reverse osmosis of a highly concentrated multi-solute solution such as fruit juice, applicability of the osmotic pressure model, which takes into account the effect of the concentration polarization phenomenon on the permeate flux value, to a binary solute solution containing sucrose and glucose was evaluated.
To adapt the model to the highly concentrated binary solute solution, methods to estimate the dependence of density, viscosity, osmotic pressure, and solute diffusivity on the solute concentration were investigated.
Defining the solution properties, the experimental permeate flux values agreed well with values calculated by the osmotic pressure model. The model, which had been applied only for dilute solutions containing one component, was therefore able to predict precisely the permeate flux for the highly concentrated binary solute solution without using any fitting parameters.