Membrane Pilot Achieves 99% Cooling Tower Blowdown Recovery

• 99% Membrane System Recovery on Scaling Cooling Tower Blowdown
• Removing the Need for an Evaporation Pond, Saving Water, and Reducing-GHG Emissions
• First-of-its-Kind Ultra-High Recovery Membrane System

Reverse osmosis-based brine concentrators are reaching new performance levels not seen before. Saltworks is pleased to report that a substantial pilot plant is currently demonstrating 99% freshwater recovery on cooling tower blowdown (CTB). CTB enters the treatment plant nearly saturated in scaling ions, which would limit recoveries to 80% for RO plants — not good enough to solve this site’s water balance needs.

How did the plant reach 99% recovery? We started with an 80% recovery conventional solution and then bolted on our turbo-chargers: Saltworks’ BrineRefine and Saltworks’ XtremeRO, utilizing Nitto HYDRANAUTICSTM PRO-XP1 reverse osmosis membranes.

BrineRefine removes scaling ions, enabling reverse osmosis (RO) to reach its osmotic pressure limits without scaling or fouling. With the scaling ions removed and Nitto-Hydranautics membranes inside, XtremeRO concentrates the water — first at 1200 psi (seawater RO) and then at 1800 psi (UHP-RO). The 99% permeate can be reused by the client, which enables the industrial facility to drastically reduce river water withdrawal in a drought-sensitive region. The ultra-high recovery with 1% brine prevents the need for a more costly and energy-intensive thermal evaporator, potentially controversial evaporation pond expansions, or GHG-intensive trucking of wastewater.

Saltworks has successfully demonstrated UHP RO on various customer applications including mining waters, factory wastewater, ion exchange regeneration waste, and cooling tower blowdown. This pilot plant, jointly developed with Nitto Hydranautics, is packaged and ready-to-go in two 40’ ISO shipping containers for portability and ease of site setup. Full-scale systems including UHP RO are being produced at Saltworks’ advanced manufacturing plant in Richmond, BC, Canada.

We would love to help you achieve your water goals. Whether you seek conventional or advanced solutions, we can help. Contact us to learn more about treating cooling tower blowdown or other challenging waters. Let us know if your team is interested in a webinar to learn about the latest in advanced membrane systems, selective ion removal, or zero liquid discharge (ZLD).

About Nitto
Nitto is Japan’s leading diversified materials manufacturer. Based on four core technologies: adhesion, coating, polymer function control, and polymer analysis & evaluation, Nitto provides customers with various products such as polarizing films for displays, industrial adhesive tapes, reverse osmosis membranes for desalination and transdermal drug delivery patches. Under the brand slogan of “Innovation for Customers”, Nitto is contributing to a better life by solving social issues and improving corporate value.

Hydranautics is a part of the Nitto Group and one of the global leaders in the field of integrated membrane solutions. Hydranautics offers complete membrane solutions like reverse osmosis, nanofiltration, ultrafiltration, and microfiltration for water, wastewater and process treatment and applications. For more information, visit www.nitto.com and www.membranes.com.

About Saltworks
Saltworks Technologies is a leader in the development and delivery of solutions for industrial wastewater treatment and desalination. By working with customers to understand their unique challenges and focusing on continuous innovation, Saltworks’ solutions provide best-in-class performance and reliability on challenging waters. From its headquarters in Richmond, BC, Canada, Saltworks designs, builds, and operates full-scale treatment plants, and offers comprehensive offsite and onsite testing services with its fleet of mobile pilots.