Innovative hydrodynamic clarification as pretreatment for reverse osmosis (RO) membranes

We describe a rapid in-line hydrodynamic clarification process that does not require a filtration barrier for source water pretreatment in front of RO membranes. Innovations of this novel approach include fluidic structures for rapid coagulation, floc conditioning, and hydrodynamic pin floc separation. The ability to treat neutrally buoyant suspensions makes this method ideal for seawater, which has high organic content -- resulting water quality is shown to be comparable to permeate waters from MF systems.