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We investigated the effect of coagulant basicity on bacteriophage removal from river water by polyferric chloride (PFC). PFC at three basicities (basicity 0.9–2.1) was prepared by means of base titration (NaOH was added to ferric chloride (FeCl3) solution) and the virus removal efficiencies of those PFCs were compared with that of FeCl3 (basicity 0). The virus removal efficiencies of the PFCs were equal to or less than that of FeCl3 at both pH 6 and pH 8. This suggests that, unlike aluminum-based coagulants, increasing the basicity of iron-based coagulants does not improve virus removal efficiency. Furthermore, the relative abundance of monomeric iron(III) species in the PFCs decreased, whereas that of precipitated iron(III) species increased with increasing basicity, as assessed with a ferron method. Colloid charge density also decreased with increasing basicity. Therefore, it is likely that the reduction in the abundance of monomeric iron(III) species led to the reduction in colloid charge density, which then reduced virus removal efficiency. Thus, the development of novel iron-based coagulants with increased virus removal efficiency may not be possible by simply increasing the basicity of the coagulant.

The feasibility of in-line coagulation as a pretreatment for ceramic microfiltration (MF) was verified by comparing its efficiency in the removal of viruses with that of the traditional mechanical mixing approach for coagulation, and by examining the effect of coagulant dose and coagulation time on virus removal. The in-line coagulation–ceramic MF system efficiently removed bacteriophage Qβ and MS2: removal ratios were >8.2 log for infectious viruses and >5.4 log for total (infectious + inactivated) virus particles. These values were similar to those of the mechanical coagulation–ceramic MF system. The in-line coagulation system has potential as a useful pretreatment for the removal of viruses as an alternative to the mechanical mixing system, because the former efficiently removes viruses and has a smaller footprint in treatment plants. For the in-line coagulation–ceramic MF system, a coagulant dose of 1.08 mg-Al/L and a coagulation time of 1 min were required to achieve a high level of virus removal. Infectious Qβ and MS2 were removed to similar levels by the two precoagulation methods tested, but the removal of total MS2 particles was higher than that of Qβ particles, possibly because of the selective interaction with the cake layer.

We evaluated the removal of virus (bacteriophage Qβ) after hydraulic backwashing and the effects of reversible and irreversible membrane fouling on virus removal by a coagulation–microfiltration (MF) system. The rate of virus removal in the coagulation–MF system was low at the beginning of filtration but increased with filtration time, owing to the accumulation of foulant on the membrane. The rate of virus removal thereafter remained high, even after hydraulic backwashing of the membrane to remove reversible membrane foulant. The presence of irreversible, rather than reversible, membrane foulant contributed to the increase in virus removal rate observed at the beginning of filtration. The irreversible membrane fouling maintained a high virus removal rate even after hydraulic backwashing. Moreover, irreversible fouling of the membrane during long-term filtration (1 month) improved virus removal in the coagulation–MF system, and the membrane excluded virus particles even in the absence of coagulation pretreatment. Therefore, the accumulation of irreversible membrane foulant with filtration time played an important role in virus removal by the coagulation–MF system.