Toray to launch new ultralow-pressure RO membrane elements

The new offerings significantly improve the rejection of silica, boron, and other neutral molecules from untreated water by controlling RO membrane micropore sizes and membrane structures.

Impurity rejection with the TBW-HR series exceeds that of existing ultra-low pressure RO membrane elements. A key benefit is the purification of higher quality and higher purity water. The resulting ultrapure water enables the production of semiconductors with finer wires. 

Internal and external evaluations verified the high level of performance of the new series, which Toray will target initially at water engineering firms providing ultrapure water production equipment. The company also plans to broaden applications to include wastewater reuse.

Demand within the electronics industry for even purer water has risen in recent years due to the production of finer wiring. This is particularly important in the manufacturing of increasingly compact and complex semiconductors. Ultrapure water production conventionally entails undertaking additional electrodeionization and other processes for water treated with RO membrane elements. Boosting purity necessitates removing silica and boron, which are electrically neutral and have small particles, as well as organic matter with low molecular weights. It is hard to achieve this with electrodeionization. 

For its new series, Toray accordingly developed an RO membrane element with double the neutral molecular component rejection capacity of the company’s conventional offerings. It achieved this by maintaining low operating pressures and high solute rejection by precisely controlling RO membrane micropore sizes and enhancing the membrane fold structure.