Sustainable pressure-driven membrane facility controlled by a smartphone application for groundwater desalination in the dry zone of Sri Lanka

Z Wu,R Pathmanadan,S Dayaratna,T Ritigala,N Senanayake,R Weerasooriya,S.K Weragoda,A.C.A Jayasundara,D Bandara,L Jayarathna,Y Wei,X Chen

doi:10.4038/cjs.v51i1.7979

Abstract

The Ceylon Journal of Science is published by the University of Peradeniya, Sri Lanka. Full text available. The journal also has its own website. The Ceylon Journal of Science is a continuation of the Ceylon Journal of Science (Biological Sciences) which is no longer being published as a separate journal. The history of the journal can be found here.From May 2020, Ceylon Journal of Science is indexed in DOAJ.

Highlights

The United Nations declares to provide safe drinking water and sanitation to the entire globe by 2030 (UN Sustainable Development Goals 6) (United Nations, 2015)
Presently over three million people, mostly living in the dry zone of Sri Lanka, experiencing acute water stress due to excess salinity which results in palatability problems
In many parts of the world, reverse osmosis (RO) and nanofiltration (NF) technologies are successfully used for water desalination

Summary

Introduction

The United Nations declares to provide safe drinking water and sanitation to the entire globe by 2030 (UN Sustainable Development Goals 6) (United Nations, 2015). The Government of Sri Lanka states that safe water for Sri Lanka must be provided by 2025 (Ministry of FinanceGovernment of Sri Lanka, 2020). In Sri Lanka, over three million people, mostly from the North and North Central Provinces, suffer water stress due to a lack of access to safe drinking water within 200 m of their residence (Fan, 2015). Most of the water sources in the dry zone have excess salinity (e.g. high total dissolved solids, TDS) renders them unpalatable most of the saline water experiences high hardness and fluoride levels, which further complicates its direct consumption. Hardness, and fluoride problems in Sri Lanka are controlled largely by geogenic factors (Jayasena et al, 2008). Water desalination is first desired to improve palatability, and assess residual solutes for additional treatments, if needed (Porada et al, 2013)

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