Authors: Mohammad Mahdi A Shirazi, Ali Kargari, Seeram Ramakrishna, James Doyle, Murugan Rajendrian, Ramesh Babu P

Publication Date: 01/07/2017

Journal: Journal of Membrane Science and Research

Volume: 3

Issue: 3

Pages: 209-227

Publisher: FIMTEC & MPRL

With our growing global population and ever increasing economic expansion, we have entered a potential crisis point in balancing the supply and availability of fresh water resources [1, 2]. Continual changes in production, consumption, markets and political governance have led to an increase in demand for fresh water. The urban population is expected to grow from approximately 2,522 million in 1950 to 8,909 million in 2050 [3, 4]. Forecasts up to 2030 indicate an increase in global water uptake of about 40% of the current accessible and reliable supply sources, meaning an intensification of water consumption [5]. Global data suggests that approximately 780 million people cannot access safe drinking water, 1.1 billion people do not have the facilities to improve drinking water bodies and that 2.6 billion people live with substandard sanitation [6-8]. Consequently, the need for technological innovation to enable novel desalination and water/wastewater treatment technologies cannot be overstated [9, 10]. In this regard, nanotechnology holds a great potential in advancing water and wastewater treatment by improving the efficiency of impurity removal as well as augmenting the water supply via safe use of unconventional water resources.

Advances in nanotechnology could greatly help overcome the current issues of meeting the demand of clean water supplies using novel, nanostructured/nanoengineered materials produced by the electrospinning process. Electrospinning has attracted increased attention as a versatile technique, applicable to numerous organic and inorganic systems and a wide range of applications (see Figure 1) which can …