Advanced Membrane Technology to Remove Boron from Water and Wastewater: A Comprehensive Study

Abstract

The rise in boron demand for global industries causes the anthropogenic release of this element to water streams, deteriorating water quality and challenging ecological sustainability. Stringent water quality standards are necessary to address boron contamination, often resolved by boron absorbing materials, ion exchange resins, and membrane filtration. Low energy consumption, simplicity in the process, highly pure filtrated water, and adaptive flexibility offered by the membrane processes concentrate the researcher's interest in this technology for selective boron removal. This review focuses on the mechanism and chemistry of specific membrane processes in eliminating the pollutant from wastewater. Different types of membrane processes such as forward osmosis, reverse osmosis, distillation, nanofiltration, dialysis, and hybrid structures are explored in their nature and properties with respect to boron removing efficiency. A comprehensive view is provided by summarizing the different membrane-based process architectures with the advantages and weak points of each type. The possible industrial scalability of the processes in terms of durability and efficiency is discussed throughout. Ultimately, the future technological influence and the different modern strategies that can be adopted for membrane fabrication and, thereby, boron removal are mentioned.