Wastewater Treatment: Water, Water… Everywhere?
Contents
Introduction
Treatment technologies grow
Market forces
Demand globally is strong
Segments
Municipal, industrial, agricultural
Market movers
Leaders & fast followers
Investors
VC / PE / Funds
Wastewater Treatment Tech Seeks to Meet Need
Demand to treat wastewater soars as population climbs
While water covers more than 2/3 of the earth, there’s often, as the saying goes, not enough to drink.
When water is used — in washing our hands, making medicine, growing crops — dirty water is made. With earth’s limited freshwater resources, treatment is critical to ensure the supply of clean H2O.
And yet 80% of the world’s wastewater likely gets discharged directly into the environment without treatment. As populations surge and climate change alters weather patterns, an urgent need for the expansion of wastewater treatment infrastructure and more cost-effective options for treatment technologies is arising.
While water demand dropped during COVID-19, the need is expected to quickly ramp up to pre-pandemic levels. According to a survey conducted by the Global Water Leaders Group, the response to COVID-19 by industry globally caused a 27% reduction in industrial water usage.
Innovation in wastewater treatment technologies such as membrane filtration systems, automatic variable filtration (AVF), advanced oxidation processes (AOPs), and UV irradiation have been designed, evaluated, and implemented to satisfy both current and future treatment needs. Ozone treatment and bioremediation developed by Culligan Industrial Water and Suez Worldwide are among the later technologies propelling the market.
“Since 80% of the world’s wastewater likely gets discharged directly into the environment without treatment, an urgent need exists for more treatment infrastructure and cost-effective options for treatment technologies.”
Market Trends: Solid demand for clean water
Facts, figures, forces
Market Forces
Increasingly stringent regulations from agencies such as the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) require a higher level of effective wastewater treatment.
Growing populations, an expanding manufacturing industry and urbanization are also major drivers of the wastewater treatment services market.
Water consumption globally increases about 1% a year, the U.N. says, and will continue at this pace until 2050. This means that from the present, usage will rise by as much as 30%, driving demand for technologies that treat wastewater.
Market facts
Israel treats about 90% of its wastewater, more than any other country. In the U.S., 75% of the country is connected to a wastewater collection and treatment system.
The U.S. has 16,000 wastewater plants, and about 15% are operating at or above capacity.
Adopting circular-economy principles in wastewater treatment/management through the recovery of biogas and nutrients could transform sanitation from a costly service to a self-sustaining economic value-add.
The United Nations lists “clean water and sanitation” among its 17 sustainable development goals (SDGs).
market Figures
The investment gap for water infrastructure — which is the difference between what is budgeted for pipes, treatment and tanks vs. what is actually needed — was $81 billion in 2019, according to the U.S. Water Alliance.
According to the EPA, U.S. communities will need to spend $271 billion over the next 20 years in order to bring their wastewater treatment systems to a state of good working order.
Source: UN Progress on wastewater treatment report, 2021
Investment Opportunities
The wastewater treatment market mainly focuses on three kinds of treatment, each offering opportunities to investors. The kinds of treatment include:
Physical Water Treatment
Processes such as screening, sedimentation, and skimming are used for cleaning wastewater, with no chemicals added.
Physical treatment often requires additional processes to remove smaller particles.
Filtration methods such as screens, sand filtration, and cross flow filtration membranes are often the primary treatment steps in municipal wastewater treatment processes.
Biological Water Treatment
Biological wastewater treatment is an economical means of removing organic contaminants from wastewater. While it is commonly used for the treatment of domestic sanitary wastewater, it is also effective for industrial wastes.
Activated sludge is a process that uses microorganisms in a tank to break down organic material, cleaning wastewater sufficiently to permit its discharge into rivers, lakes, or streams.
Chemical Water Treatment
Chemical water treatment includes pH conditioners, coagulants and flocculants, disinfectants and biocidal products, and more. Chemical coagulation speeds up the time it takes solids to settle on their own.
The most commonly used chemical in water treatment is chlorine, an oxidizing agent that kills bacteria. Chlorination may be followed by dechlorination in order to both avoid deteriorating the ecological health of the receiving water and hinder the production of carcinogenic byproducts.
Market Segments: Municipal, Industrial, Agricultural
Municipal
With rapid urbanization rates throughout the world, municipal water treatment is becoming increasingly critical.
The principle of the conventional activated sludge (CAS) for municipal wastewater treatment is primarily based on biological oxidation by which organic matter is converted to biomass and carbon dioxide.
Industrial
Industrial wastewater comes from a variety of sources: manufacturing, petrochemicals, agriculture, power generation and pharmaceuticals.
Continued industrialization of developing economies is expected to drive the need for wastewater treatment, with the boiler-feed water segment constituting a prominent share of the global market.
Agricultural
Agriculture accounts for more than 70% of global water use the World Bank says. Effluents from agricultural wastewater contribute to eutrophication problems both in freshwater bodies and the oceans.
With its large-scale production in the sugar and paper industries, the Latin American market should dominate in the area of agricultural wastewater treatment. As such, the Brazil-based CAESB water and wastewater utility’s use of biosolids for corn production has led to higher-than-average grain yields with 21% greater efficiency than with mineral fertilizers.
“The promotion of the safe reuse of treated wastewater should be prioritized”
U.N. Progress on wastewater treatment report, 2021
Wastewater Treatment's Impact
Wastewater treatment around the globe is uneven, the U.N. says. The global average for household wastewater treatment is 56%, with some regions as low as 25%.
Industrial wastewater treatment globally was difficult to determine, the UN report said. A survey representing 4% of the world’s population found 30% of industrial water was treated.
While wastewater treatment systems help reduce environmental impacts, they can also create negative life cycle impacts, mainly in the form of higher energy consumption. For example, about 2% of U.S. electricity goes toward pumping and treating water and wastewater.
Inadequately treated wastewater from treatment plants significantly influences the river ecosystem, as both toxic matter, such as heavy metals and pesticides, and excess nutrients discharged into rivers negatively affect the photosynthetic organisms therein.
Market Movers: Current and Future Heavy Hitters
Market Movers:
Hydro International, based in the U.K., has 40 years of experience in the treatment of wastewater, stormwater, and industrial water, in addition to flood control. The company offers both water treatment products and services including installation, operation, and maintenance.
Orenco Systems provides residential, commercial, and municipal wastewater systems. Based in Oregon, the company has more than 300 points of distribution in North America, Australia, Europe, Africa, and southwest Asia.
Calgon Carbon Corp. is a Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania-based company that manufactures and markets products such as FILTRASORB (an agglomerated, coal-based activated carbon) that remove contaminants and odors from liquids and gasses for industrial, municipal, and consumer markets.
Xylem, based in Washington, D.C., recently launched a new technology called “pollution dilution” — which holds that waste such as affluent will become harmless once introduced into much larger bodies of water — to enhance its wastewater treatment process. It also offers digital solutions that help prevent overflows and increase energy efficiency in the monitoring and controlling of wastewater treatment systems.
SUEZ Worldwide of Paris has been supplying water, sanitation, waste collection, and waste recovery services for more than 160 years. In 2020, the company announced that it signed an agreement to purchase the Reverse Osmosis (RO) Membrane portfolio from the specialty chemical company LANXESS in order to increase its ability to help customers address water treatment challenges.
DuPont Chemicals was founded in 1897 in Delaware. DuPont Water Solutions, its subsidiary company that focuses on wastewater treatment and water management, uses FilmTec Fortilife reverse osmosis technology to increase water efficiency to the point of zero liquid discharge, with its most notable current application being within the textile industry in India.
Kemira, which is based in Finland, is a global chemicals company that serves customers in water-intensive industries. Its wastewater technology focuses on chemical treatment — factoring in nutrient removal and recovery in its process — in order to minimize the footprint of treatment plants.
Future Heavy Hitters
Carbogenics, a company that was spun off from the University of Edinburgh, produces sustainable carbon adsorbents — which permit solids to cling to their surface, rather that being absorbed into their bulk — from difficult-to-recycle organic waste, including coffee cups and wastewater screenings.
Epic Cleantec deploys on-site water treatment and reuse systems for individual buildings or groups of buildings, converting building wastewater into treated water for non-potable applications, natural soil amendments, and recovered wastewater heat energy. The company originated from the research project “Reinvent the Toilet” under the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
Axine Water of British Columbia developed a low-cost, chemical-free electrochemical process for removing organic matter and ammonia from industrial wastewater.
Venture Capital/PE and Other Fund Investors
ISA Ventures,in August 2021, announced a $6.5 million series A venture capital joint investment in Gross-Wen Technologies, an Iowa-based start-up that has developed a patented technology using algae to clean wastewater.
XVP Water Partners invests in water technology solutions, including several wastewater treatment companies such as BCR Solid Solutions, EOSI, Newterra, and Nexom.
Qstone Capital is an independent investment advisory boutique dedicated to the global wastewater treatment and technology markets.
Final Thoughts
Though essential to everyday life and industrial productions, wastewater treatment has often been underfunded by governments and agencies. As countries impose stricter environmental regulation regarding wastewater, more investment will be required to both update aging infrastructure in developed countries to accommodate new technologies and install new infrastructure in places where wastewater is discharged without treatment. Without renewing outdated infrastructure, the penetration rate of new wastewater treatment technologies will remain low. And the need for achieving better water treatment rates is projected to offer lucrative opportunities for the global wastewater treatment market growth.
The wastewater treatment market faces challenges such as high installation, equipment, and operations costs. But with 40% of the global population living in water-stressed regions, an essential service such as wastewater treatment cannot be neglected.
Aging infrastructure in developed countries could slow the growth of the market and the adoption of new technologies. However, this also presents an opportunity to integrate novel technologies into existing infrastructure.