Economic Analysis of Membrane-Based Separation of Biocatalyst: Mode of Operation and Stage Configuration

Abstract

As the use of biocatalyst proliferates due to the need for chirally pure active pharmaceutical ingredients (API), the corresponding separation of biocatalyst and API is crucial. Although economic analyses of membrane-filtration applications exist, one dedicated to the ultrafiltration of biocatalysts remained amiss, which motivated the current study. The costs for different operating modes (i.e., constant-flux or constant-TMP) and stage configurations (i.e., single versus multiple stages), as well as the effects of feed flow rate, flux, transmembrane pressure (TMP), membrane area, recovery, and filtration rate, were evaluated. The results indicate that a capital expenditure of $1.35 million and an annual operating expenditure of $85.6 thousand are needed to install a new ultrafiltration unit for a yearly permeation of 0.64 billion liters. While capital cost depends heavily on membrane area, operating cost depends on TMP and fluid flow across the unit.