A Better Way To Reactivate Granular Activated Carbon With Filtrasorb® Rx

Granular activated carbon (GAC) reactivation offers drinking water utilities a way to reduce the total cost of treating per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) while avoiding the disposal and environmental impacts associated with media destruction. However, reactivated carbon products can vary in quality, contaminant removal, and performance consistency. Calgon Carbon’s Filtrasorb Rx uses a proprietary thermal reactivation process that keeps each customer’s spent media segregated, tests incoming carbon for potentially interfering compounds, and returns the reactivated product to its originating utility. The process achieves greater than 99.9% destruction removal efficiency for PFOA, PFOS, and other PFAS, while producing media designed to perform comparably to virgin Filtrasorb carbon. Studies using East Coast groundwater, West Coast groundwater, and surface water demonstrate consistent PFAS removal across different contaminant concentrations and carbon mesh sizes. Results also show that Filtrasorb Rx avoids the PFAS desorption and effluent concentration spikes observed with some competing media. Together, these findings support reactivation as a potential long-term strategy for managing GAC costs and maintaining treatment performance.