This one-year award supports planning and initiation of a U.S.- U.K. cooperative research project in environmental engineering. The researchers are Michael Semmens and John Gulliver at the University of Minnesota, Thomas Stephenson at Cranfield University and Andrew Livingston at Imperial College in the United Kingdom. They plan a cooperative research project on the technical and economic feasibility of using membranes for gas transfer in water and wastewater treatment applications. The objective is to identify how design and operating conditions influence overall process performance and economics of biological and gas transfer processes. The U. S. investigators have developed new gas-permeable hollow-fiber membranes for the transfer of gases such as oxygen into water. This is complemented by British expertise on applications of membrane technology in biological waste treatment and chemical separation processes. The joint effort has potential for improving a delivery system for pure oxygen in the treatment of wastewaters.
