الفهرس 
INTRODUCTIONOnly 14 pages are availabe for public view
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Abstract
The need to provide new sources of water is not an option anymore and a necessity for the continuation of life with the steady increase of the population in Egypt. For this reason, the Egyptian vision 2030 was included an increasing in non-conventional water resources like desalination techniques, water reuse and rainfall. There are currently 21000 desalination plants operating around the world and the process becomes more important in arid lands like Middle East. Thus, the objective of this research is to evaluate the factors affecting reverse osmosis desalination technology and study the way to maximize product output.
For this target, an experimental investigation was designed using a simple device consisting of two diaphragm pumps with pressure switch and three categories of pressure vessels; One pressure vessel containing one spiral wound membrane that would be category (A); four pressure vessels containing one (SWM) connecting in parallel that would be category (B); A new approach of design was developed by using four spiral wound membrane elements connected together in parallel and that would be category (C).
A comparison was made between these three setups following the same different values of input pressures, temperature and salinities. The output flux and salinity for the permeate and brine water were measured. The input pressures ranges from 6 to 12 bars, the salinity ranges from 1000 to 3000 ppm and the temperature from 25°C to 40°C.
In the new approach, the permeate flux found to be in the same range with the ordinary system while the product salinity is slightly enhanced. This could be used to decrease the total cost of reverse osmosis process due to the decrease in the number of used pressure vessels.
A numerical study was performed using computational fluid dynamic (CFD) with the aid of finite element analysis (FEA) to simulate the experimental research under same boundary conditions and measuring corresponding outputs. The results showed an acceptable correlation with experimental investigation.
Expanding the numerical study to conclude a simulation of a spiral wound, cylindrical shaped, RO desalination membrane based on a data taken from Al-Romela phase (2) desalination plant located at Matrooh, Egypt. The model showed that the plant could operate at an optimal pressure of 58 instead of 64 bars, saving 9% in power and cost.
Based on experimental results, a correlation between variables is determined. Two methods were used in this study: linear regression and gradient boosting (machine learning), with illustrations for each. With the aid of laboratory data, gradient boosting appeared to be the most suitable and successful method for predicting reverses osmosis performance accurately.