Pilot and full-scale applications of membrane processes for textile wastewater treatment: A critical review

Textile industries consume huge amount of water, which is more than that is consumed by most of the other industries. Wastewater generated from textile industries contains high concentrations of pollutants, thus, the wastewater needs to be treated before discharging. Besides, since large amount of wastewater is produced, reuse of treated wastewater should be considered in environmental aspects. Since textile wastewater contains mainly dyestuffs, it must be treated effectively using environmentally friendly technologies. Membrane processes are widely used in textile wastewater treatment, as they have distinct advantages over conventional wastewater treatment methods. Most of the research done so far has been conducted in lab-scale, but gradually both pilot and full-scale systems have been applied. This review provides a comprehensive view of the treatment of textile wastewater and its reuse after proper treatment by membrane technologies at both pilot- and full-scale applications. For this purpose, physical and biological treatment methods were examined separately. As a result of the examination, it was observed that according to the characteristics of textile wastewater and discharge standards, hybrid systems were generally used in the literature and very good results were obtained in terms of both filtration and treatment performance. Besides, cleaning methods and economic feasibility for the membrane processes are also investigated in textile wastewater treatment. Furthermore, due to the fact that full-scale studies are less in comparison to pilot-scale studies, deficiencies in processes are mentioned in order to support future research studies.