Artemis Water Strategy

Water resilience for a thirsty future

In Fracking’s Wake

The following appeared in the Wall Street Journal on September 11, 2011

By YULIYA CHERNOVA

[H2O] Joe Duty
BY THE TRUCKLOAD With fracking’s growth, tankers unloading wastewater keep a Texas recycling site busy

The growing volume of dirty water produced in shale-gas drilling has triggered a gold rush among water-treatment companies.

Energy companies increasingly are drilling for natural gas using hydraulic fracturing, or fracking. In this process, water mixed with sand and chemicals is pumped into a well under high pressure; the mixture fractures the rock, allowing the gas to escape. Huge amounts of water are used, and about 10% to 40% of it emerges after a frack job, laced with a variety of contaminants.

Even as the volume of dirty water grows, the traditional methods of disposal are narrowing. Several states are considering or have recently imposed limits on wastewater disposal underground or in streams. Meanwhile, record drought in some drilling areas is making access to fresh water for drilling more difficult, costly and unpopular.

The net result: “For the first time there’s a strong driver for technology” to clean up the wastewater from mines so it can be reused, says Laura Shenkar, founder of  Artemis Water Strategy, a water-technology consulting firm. Dozens of water-treatment companies have started up in the past year or so, and many of the more established companies are adapting their techniques for use in the shale-gas industry. How many of those companies the market can support remains to be seen.

Plenty of Options

Companies are using several different approaches to shale-gas wastewater treatment.

[H2O2online]

Ecosphere Technologies Inc., based in Stuart, Fla., is one of the dominant providers of water treatment for the shale-gas industry, according to Lux Research, a technology research and consulting firm. The company’s technology avoids the use of chemicals typically employed to treat wastewater.

Ecosphere’s process forces dirty water through pipes where ozone breaks down contaminants with the help of sound waves, electrically charged particles and changes in pressure. No waste is created in the process, because while the technology renders contaminants harmless it doesn’t filter anything out.

Another strong competitor for new business, according to Lux analyst Brent Giles, is WaterTectonics Inc., based in Everett, Wash. The company uses a process called electric coagulation, in which an electric charge forces contaminant particles into clumps that can be removed after they either rise to the surface of the water or sink to the bottom. The process avoids the use of chemicals, but it does produce waste that has to be disposed of.

Another company, Altela Inc., based in Albuquerque, N.M., earned a spot on Artemis Project’s 2011 list of the 50 most innovative water-technology companies in the U.S. Its technology mimics rainmaking. Wastewater is heated to the point of evaporation, which produces clean water in the form of vapor, leaving contaminant particles behind. The vapor is then condensed back into liquid form.

The basic process, called thermal distillation, isn’t new, but Altela has found a way to make it more efficient, by capturing the heat generated by condensation and using it for evaporation. Ned Godshall, the company’s chief executive, says Altela’s method uses a third of the energy typically required for conventional thermal distillation.

Do It Yourself

One potential drag on the use of all these technologies: Some drillers have started to simply reuse their wastewater without fully treating it. But it isn’t clear how much of a factor that will be. Many technology companies and some researchers argue that there is a limit to such recycling because it doesn’t clean the water enough for it to be used repeatedly and still be effective. The particles in dirty water can damage equipment and block the release of gas from the shale.

“When I learned in early 2010 that they were going to recycle, I thought they were going to do a real heavy-duty treatment” before reusing the water, says John Veil, who analyzed water treatment for the oil and gas industry for many years at the Argonne National Laboratory, and now does so at his own consulting firm. “They are not. All they are doing is getting out the big sand grains in a [filtering] process as simple as pouring the water through pantyhose.”

Ms. Chernova is a special writer for Dow Jones VentureWire in New York. She can be reached at yuliya.chernova@dowjones.com.

Water Treatment Firms See Boon in Business as Gas Drilling Spreads

A new measure imposed by Pennsylvania regulators to stop natural gas drillers from disposing harmful wastewater at treatment plants has sent the industry scrambling for alternatives.

Companies specializing in the latest filtration technologies are rushing to meet the need. Some firms are already positioned with proven solutions that can handle wastewater from fracking operations. Many others are working feverishly to apply their technologies to cash in on the boom in business. Read the full story.

 

 

New York could be first state to ban controversial drilling practice

STORY HIGHLIGHTS
  • New York’s state assembly passed a limited ban on hydraulic fracturing
  • Also known as “fracking,” it’s a controversial method of drilling for natural gas
  • The EPA is studying whether fracking contaminates ground water

New York Gov. David Paterson, left, with New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg.
(CNN) — New York could be the first state in the country to impose a limited ban on a controversial method of drilling for natural gas.This week, the state assembly passed a hydraulic fracturing moratorium bill, which is currently en route to New York Gov. David Paterson’s desk. He will have 10 days from then to take action.In the past, Paterson has expressed concern about hydraulic fracturing, which involves cracking thousands of feet beneath the earth’s surface to get at valuable natural gas. It is unclear if the governor will sign or veto the legislation.”He’ll hear what everybody has to say,” a representative of the governor’s office told CNN. She would not provide her name.Read the full story.

Desalitech Reduces Costs of Desalination

Middelgrunden Windmills Outside Copenhagen
Efficient desalination can utilize alternative energy, like these Danish windmills, thus relying on the ocean twice. / Photo: andjohan on Flickr

The most common question I field when I mention desalination is, “Doesn’t that take a lot of energy?”

The truth is, yes, it does. That’s why you’ll not hear me advocate for desalination without strongly insisting on complementary conservation.

We must redouble our conservation efforts by upgrading infrastructure intelligently and in no way excuse wasteful water practices by pointing to the plentiful, historical ingredients of desalination: oceans of water and oceans of coal.

Each barrel of freshwater extracted from the ocean has costs, so we should use the water as efficiently as possible, recycling it and then remediating it into the water cycle.

Yet, conservation alone isn’t going to meet our water needs. The world’s population is expected to increase by 2.5 billion over the next 30 – 40 years, while the current, natural water cycle is not expected to increase its output.

Just as we must increase conservation, we must prepare for the impending water plateau by increasing our capacity to produce fresh water.

Hence my excitement in June when I heard about Desalitech’s successful pilot.The test purified Mediterranean saltwater, using Desalitech’s proprietary Closed-Circuit Desalination saltwater reverse osmosis method (SWRO-CCD).

Using common components, without energy recovery, running a high-pressure pump at 81% mean efficiency and circulation pump at 37.5% mean efficiency, the pilot achieved 48% recovery at 2.05 – 2.40 kWh per cubic meter of fresh water. For comparison, Perth’s desalination plant using Energy Recovery from ERI achieves 43% recovery at 2.32 kWh/m3.

Desalitech aims to increase the mean efficiency of the off-the-shelf, high-pressure pump to 88%, to provide recovery at 1.75 – 1.95 kWh/m3 on Mediterranean saltwater. The same pumps used on ocean water could produce equal recovery at 1.5 – 1.7 kWh/m3.

Desalitech’s implementation reduces the cost of powering desalination processes. It also decreases capital expenditures. Nadav Efraty, CEO of Desalitech, told me, “This technology is reducing energy consumption by up to 50% when we utilize about twice the membranes, reduces energy by about 10-15% when we use only 40% of the membranes compared to a conventional plant, or reduces energy about 30% when we utilizes the same amount of membranes, but in this mode, since we don’t utilize any form of energy recovery, we still see a reduction in capital expenditures.”

Even with less than half the membranes, the technology still sees 10-15% energy reduction. That’s a 60% savings on capital expenditures for membranes.

As an added element of efficiency, plants utilizing Desalitech’s technology can turn plants up and down depending on demand: Nadav explained, “The very same unit can operate at very high production rates part of the day (when power rates are low for example) and in extremely low energy consumption the rest of the day.”

Desalitech does this by independently controlling component flow rates, recovery, pressures and cross flow irrespective of the other variables.

Following their successful pilot, Desalitech is addressing brackish water. Desalitech’s three BWRO installations are fully operational facilities, capable of producing 10,000 m3 fresh water per day.

 

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