CFD Modeling of Crossflow Membrane Filtration – Integration of Filtration Model and Fluid Transport Model E.H. Khor*, P. Kumar, Y. Samyudia Department of Chemical Engineering, Curtin University of Technology, 98000 Miri, Sarawak, Malaysia E,mail address: khor.ee.huey@stud.curtin.edu.my !"#$% & ’ & ()* ! + , - . I. INTRODUCTION The determination of oil in produced water has been carried out for nearly two decades using solvent based extraction followed by infra,red quantification. However, following Freon being banned from used due to ozone depletion and the concerns over health and safety of its replacement Tetrachloroethylene (TTCE), OSLO,PARIS commission (OSPAR) implemented a new standard method across North Sea in 2007. The method is called OSPAR GC, FID method but it has its own limitation [1]. Our research is to incorporate the membrane filtration as part of oil,in water analysis so that dispersed and dissolved oil can be separated and thus allowing the oil and gas operators to comply with the stringent regulations. By doing this, we need to understand fouling or gel layer built up on the membrane so that our separation of both the oils can be complete. As such, we use FLUENT model to simulate the flow pattern inside the membrane to see the velocity and pressure distribution in the membrane cassette. Using this study, we are able to design an optimum condition for our oil separation. Most of the works done on modeling are on the flow across the membrane and flux decline during filtration. Fouling models are based mainly on pore,blocking law, concentration polarization [9] and cake formation [6]. Particle deposition on the membrane had also been studied very extensively, such as in the modeling work of Elimelech and Song [10]. Several authors are also investigating the hydrodynamics of fluid relating to the membrane filtration process. Many of them model using the combination of Navier,Stokes equations and Darcy’s law. Different approaches have been performed to simulate the combined models such as finite element method [7], finite difference scheme [5], and finite volume method [8]. Finite volume method and SIMPLE algorithm are commonly used in problems dealing with fluid flow. For our simulation, we want to study the flow pattern which is inside a concealed membrane. Our membrane is a rectangular small slits, anti, gravity flow type. We therefore use commercial finite volume package FLUENT models to visualize the flow pattern inside the membrane at steady state. Our research work starts with model searching. From the many models available we had chosen two sub,models in our first stage. The first sub,model describes the fluid transport of flow parallel to the membrane while the second one describes the filtration across the membrane. The idea is to simulate the hydrodynamic characteristics which influence the solute deposition on the membrane. For our first stage, we use the models to simulate distilled (DI) water flow through membrane and validate with our experimental data. For the second stage, we use a third model (film theory model) to simulate the deposition of dispersed oil on the membrane which forms the gel layer. In this paper, it illustrates the first part of the study where filtration through membrane is studied at standard condition, room temperature and by using DI water.