AMS Introduces 'Micro-Piloting' For SafeGuard H2O Trace Metal Remediation System To Reduce Costs And Deployment Time Of Pilots

Aqua Metrology Systems (AMS), a leader in the prediction, control and treatment of trace metals, introduces a “Micro-Piloting” program for its novel intelligent SafeGuard H2O trace metal remediation system. The fully automated system generates a stannous ion reagent in-situ via an electrolytic process to treat trace metal contaminants in real-time; SafeGuard also features online trace metals analyzers to measure trace metal contamination levels and system performance in real-time. Municipal water systems or industrial facilities looking for new treatment options to remove hexavalent chromium, ionic mercury, and selenium contamination can use the Micro-Piloting program to deploy and assess demonstrations of the SafeGuard H2O technology far more quickly and for a cost that is a fraction of traditional technology demonstration pilots.

“There is a significant financial burden tied to the design, permitting and installation of demonstration pilot systems that has to be paid by someone — the client, the treatment system vendor or taxpayer through grants. These costs, which can run into hundreds of thousands of dollars, drain financial and environmental resources and are a barrier to innovation that the water treatment sector so badly needs,” said Rick Bacon, CEO of AMS. “Understandably, clients, regulators and engineers expect to see a technology demonstrated before it can be deployed. The time and costs to deploy such pilot systems is one of the reasons why the industry is so slow to adopt new innovations and is one of the reasons why start-up companies die before their innovations gain acceptance. However, the significant advantages of SafeGuard H2O system, in terms of lifetime costs, footprint and ease of deployment compared with traditional treatment systems, demonstrate how innovation can reduce the costs of drinking and wastewater treatment, and thereby widen access to safe drinking water and support tighter regulatory standards for these contaminants of concern. And now with our Micro-Piloting program, we’ve reduced the time to market, providing clients more rapid access to the benefits of the SafeGuard technology.”

According to Bacon, the AMS Micro-Piloting program has taken the principles of “Lean Startup” and applied them to reducing time to market for its technology innovations. Because the SafeGuard H2O can be fully controlled, monitored and optimized remotely, the presence of personnel on site for supervision is not required. A SafeGuard H2O pilot demonstrates, at scale, using a fraction of the eventual volume/flow to be treated. This results in a pilot with a small footprint that can be set up and operational in hours rather than days. An AMS on-site pilot will use 100 liters per day compared to other technologies that use 1,000s liters per day. SafeGuard™ H2O ensures that a larger proportion of public funding for water quality improvement is available for final projects instead of being absorbed by expensive demonstration pilots.

In a significant further step in Micro-Piloting, AMS has demonstrated that its intelligent SafeGuard H2O system can be deployed as a scaled version at AMS’s Research and Development facilities and set up to run over an extended period of time using minimal volumes of contaminated water samples shipped from the client, demonstrating its effectiveness in treating that water. This step further reduces the cost burden of demonstration pilots by eliminating both the permitting and infrastructure investments required for the pilot as well as the disruption to the client’s operations.

The first SafeGuard H2O Micro-Pilot is being undertaken at California’s Hidden Valley Lake Community Services District, live results of the system’s performance are available here.

About AMS
Aqua Metrology Systems Ltd. (AMS) believes real-time water quality analysis and remediation are essential to environmental protection. AMS is a leader in the prediction, control and treatment of disinfection byproducts (i.e., THMs) and trace metals, across municipal and industrial sectors. AMS’s online analytical instrumentation provides accurate and reliable data on water quality contaminants through continuous monitoring. AMS’s SafeGuard H2O is an intelligent water treatment system integrating real-time sensing with an innovative approach for removing trace metals.