Bed volume is a unit of volume used in adsorption and ion exchange…

Bed volume is a unit of volume used in
adsorption and ion exchange design. It is defined as the amount of water treated up to a certain point divided
by the total volume of the media in the column. It is a way of normalizing treated volumes to take into
account the size of the column so that you can compare different sized systems. Your intern found a
literature report written by the manufacturers of Media X that showed that in side by side pilot testing of
Media X and Y that 20 mg/L of contaminant was removed from a flow of 2 Mgal/day system for 1 year
before breakthrough in the Media X and only 0.5 year before breakthrough in Media Y. This report
concluded that Media X was the better choice for this water because it lasted twice as long as Media Y.
Your intern found another report, written by a UC Davis graduate, that provided additional information
regarding that side-by-side testing: namely, that the media volume used in the study was not the same. 0.5
CF of Media X and 0.2 CF Media Y. Which media provided better performance and how do you rationalize
this choice?