Office of Saline Water

T. A. Orofino, Progress Report No. 549, Office of Saline Water Research and Development, U.S. Dept, of the Interior, Washington, D.C., May 1970. 

The seminal discovery that transformed membrane separation from a laboratory to an industrial process was the development, in the early 1960s, of the Loeb-Sourirajan process for making defect-free, high flux, asymmetric reverse osmosis membranes (5). These membranes consist of an ultrathin, selective surface film on a microporous support, which provides the mechanical strength. The flux of the first Loeb-Sourirajan reverse osmosis membrane was 10 times higher than that of any membrane then avaUable and made reverse osmosis practical. The work of Loeb and Sourirajan, and the timely infusion of large sums of research doUars from the U.S. Department of Interior, Office of Saline Water (OSW), resulted in the commercialization of reverse osmosis (qv) and was a primary factor in the development of ultrafiltration (qv) and microfiltration. The development of electro dialysis was also aided by OSW funding. 

Spira.1- Wound Modules. Spiral-wound modules were used originally for artificial kidneys, but were fuUy developed for reverse osmosis systems. This work, carried out by UOP under sponsorship of the Office of Saline Water (later the Office of Water Research and Technology) resulted in a number of spiral-wound designs (63—65). The design shown in Figure 21 is the simplest and most common, and consists of a membrane envelope wound around a perforated central coUection tube. The wound module is placed inside a tubular pressure vessel, and feed gas is circulated axiaUy down the module across the membrane envelope. A portion of the feed permeates into the membrane envelope, where it spirals toward the center and exits through the coUection tube. 

The Office of Saline Water (now the Off. of Water Res. Tech.) of the U.S. Dept, of Interior pubHshed almost 1000 reports and was responsible for numerous articles on desalination. The Nuclear Desalination Information Center of Oak Ridge National Laboratory maintains a bibHography of these sources of information, which are abstracted and indexed in ORNL-NDlC-11 and -13. 

Lindsay, W. T., Jr. Liu, C. T. "Vapor Pressure Lowering of Aqueous Solutions at Elevated Temperatures" Office of Saline Water, U.S. Government Printing Office,... 

Fabuss, B. M. Korosi, A. "Properties of Sea Water and Solutions Contaning Sodium Chloride, Potassium Chloride, Sodium Sulfate and Magnesium Sulfate" Office of Saline Water, Report No. 384, U. S. Department of the Interior,... 

Unbeknownst to Sourirajan, Breton and Reid working at the University of Florida under Office of Saline Water sponsorship, also found that cellulose acetate is semipermeable to sea water electrolytes (3, 4). Comparative results of Breton and Reid are shown in Row 1 of Table I. It can be seen that the water permeation constant is considerably higher than that of Sourirajan. 

Breton,E. J. Jr., "Water and Ion Flow Througji Inroerfect Osmotic Membranes", Office of Saline Water,U.S.Dept, of the Interior,... 

Office of Saline Water, U.S. Dept. Interior, Washington, D.C. 1969. 

Saline Water Conversion Report, pg. 232, U.S. Department of the Interior, Office of Saline Water, 1966. 

Comments on late drafts of chapters were made by a number of the authors colleagues, particularly Dr. W. McCoy (Office of Saline Water), Chapter II Prof. R. M. Fuoss (Yale), Chapter III Prof. R. Stokes (Armidale), Chapter IV Dr. R. Parsons (Bristol), Chapter VII Prof. A. N. Frumkin (Moscow), Chapter VIII Dr. H. Wroblowa, Chapter X Prof. R. Staehle (Ohio State), Chapter XI. One of the authors (A.K.N.R.) wishes to acknowledge his gratitude to the authorities of the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research, India, and the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, India, for various facilities, not the least of which were extended leaves of absence. He wishes also to thank his wife and children for sacrificing many precious hours which rightfully belonged to them. 

Cadotte, J. E. Kopp, C. V. Cobain, K. E. Rozelle, L. T. Progress Report on In Situ-Formed Condensation Polymers for Reverse Osmosis Membranes North Star Research Institute, Minneapolis, MI. Office of Saline Water Report. U.S. Department of the Interior June 1974, p 92. 

The author wishes to express his gratitude to the Office of Saline Water for its continued support of his research on water. 

The Federal Saline Water Conversion Program is administered by the Department of the Interior through the Office of Saline Water, and the primary objective of that program is to develop low-cost processes for converting saline water to fresh water. This is a most difficult problem—not because of any intricate or new chemistry, physics, or engineering involved, but because of that term, bw cost Solution of this problem will assure this nation, and the world, of an inexhaustible supply of sparkling potable water. 

The Office of Saline Water, in cooperation with the National Academy of Sciences-National Research Council, conducted a Symposium on Saline Water Conversion in 1957. A very substantial amount of work in this field has been completed since that time and the state of the art has advanced considerably. The material incorporated in this volume is a compilation of the papers presented at the Symposium on Saline Water Conversion sponsored by the American Chemical Society in 1960. Thus the information and data presented update those of the 1957 symposium and represent the current state of knowledge in this field. 

While shipboard supplies of water are vital to navies and the maritime industry, the saline water conversion program of the Department of the Interior is interested in a different phase of the over-all problem. Aboard ship the primary interest is a reliable supply of water the cost of the water is of secondary consideration. The interest of the Office of Saline Water is centered on land-based plants that can produce fresh water from the sea at low cost, the latter being the important factor. 

A process that was no more than a laboratory phenomenon when the Office of Saline Water was authorized in 1952 has been rapidly developed to the point where it is now one of the most economical processes for the conversion of brackish water to fresh. This process, electrodialysis, was selected for the third demonstration plant. It will be located at Webster, S. D. The Bureau of Reclamation Laboratories in Denver, Colo., prepared the specifications for this plant which will be designed to produce 250,000 gallons of fresh water per day. Operating on water containing between 1500 and 1800 parts of salt per million parts of water, this plant will remove more than 1 ton of salt daily to produce product water with less than 500 parts of salt per million parts of water which is required to meet U. S. Public Health Standards for good drinking water. Construction specifications for this plant were available August 1, and sealed bids will be opened on October 4, 1960. 

Other pilot plant activity includes testing of solar stills at an experimental station near Daytona Beach, Fla. At the Bureau of Reclamation Laboratories in Denver, the Office of Saline Water has two electrodialysis units, one built by Ionics, Inc., Cambridge, Mass., and the other by the Central Technical Institute, T.N.O., of the Netherlands. A Japanese electrodialysis unit is on order and will be tested at the Denver Laboratories. Various types of membranes are also being tested at Denver. Distillation experiments are continuing in research facilities located at Wrightsville Beach, N. C. 

These estimates of cost are based on the standardized procedure for estimating saline water conversion costs published by the Office of Saline Water. That procedure includes all costs at today s prices—land, capital investment, interest, operating costs, maintenance, taxes, insurance, and a rather severe 20-year amortization schedule. 

Processes, Office of Saline Water Research and Development Program, Rept. 9 (April 1956). 

The Office of Saline Water is directing a large number of investigations into the feasibility of new processes for producing fresh water starting with sea or brackish water as a source. It is desired that these plants last for 20 years or more. This paper points up ways in which the economic waste resulting from corrosion in saline water plants can be avoided. The article is based on a review of the corrosion literature and on consultations with marine experts in the field. Of the many materials for distillation plants, steel is the most important. It can be used to handle sea water below 250° F., if proper steps are taken such as the removal of all air (oxygen) from solution. For severe service and better performance metals like titanium, Hastelloy C, Monel, cupro-nickels, aluminum, aluminum brass, or Admiralty brass are used. 

The author is indebted to a large number of specialists who generously contributed time, experience, and ideas to this paper. The author very much appreciates the support of the Office of Saline Water on a project closely related to the subject of this paper. 

Solvent extraction was proposed as a method for saline water conversion by Hood and Harwell in 1953 (1), and has been under investigation since that time through support of the Office of Saline Water at Texas A M College. A number of review articles have been published concerning this process 2-5). 

W., Design, Construction and Field Testing Cost Analyses on the Experimental Electrodialysis Demineralizer for Brackish Waters, Ionics, Inc., Office of Saline Water, Research and Development Progress Report, No. 11, Washington, D. C., 1956. 

Received for review July 20, 1960. Accepted August 1, 1960. Contribution from Department of Oceanography and Meteorology, Agricultural and Mechanical College of Texas, Oceanography and Meteorology Series No. 168. Work sponsored by Office of Saline Water, U. S. Department of Interior, Contract No. 14-01001-174. 

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