Water presents a vast global market. At Infocast's 3rd Annual Water Tech Summit in Santa Clara, CA this week, the message was clear: Sustainable water solutions will create value proposition for players.
The Water Tech Summit was produced by Infocast and was designed to address business development opportunities in a flourishing water domain. The Summit provided a forum for several stakeholders to convene, exchange information, identify trends, meet venture funding, and gather the information needed for further business development. Industry experts, key players, water technology innovators, venture capitalists, manufacturers, as well as various entrepreneurs, discussed the challenges and outlook for the water industry. In today’s showcase, key players presented advanced technologies in water purification and filteration, one of the rapidly growing areas in water management. Various technologies and portfolios have been deployed, including deionization, reverse-and-forward osmosis, nanoporous membranes, and other non-chemical solutions.
Why should we care about water?
What we dump or pour into water, comes around. For example, pharmaceuticals, such as antibiotics, have been leeching into our water supplies for many years and have an impact on our water quality and our food chain.
Sustainable water has become a major issue for our society. Conventional water treatment involves chemicals to purify water and in the future biotechnology will play a significant role in the water landscape, as well as chemical free purification.
There are many costs involved and the domain is quite complicated. Water needs to be treated for destruction or removal of:
Micro contaminants (EDC), biologicals, viruses, metals, particulate larger than 12nm, sediments, various toxins, etc. There are many impurities and additives that are not disclosed, such as chemicals in shampoos and conditioners, which leech into water supplies. Water is also treated for color and odor.
Humans must have water, no matter what. We must ensure good clean water supply under any economic or political situation.
The Clean Water Act (CWA) was issued in 1972 and amended in 1977. The CWA establishes the basic structure for regulating discharges of pollutants into US waters and regulating quality standards for surface waters. Under the CWA, the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has implemented pollution control programs, set water quality standards for all contaminants in surface water, and set Compliance and Enforcement procedures. Further, the Office of Water (OW) ensures safety of drinking water, and restores and maintains oceans, watersheds, and their aquatic ecosystems to protect human health, support economic and recreational activities, and provide healthy habitat for fish, plants, and wildlife.
Recently, the EPA published a watch-list of alleged infractions of 515 water facilities that were found in non-compliance status or have unaddressed, sometimes chronic, violations. Some of these facilities are municipalities in big cities. To read more, check www.americanwaterintel.com, January 2012 issue, under "Regulation".
Source: article "Hundreds of facilities eyed in secretive EPA Watch List" from American Water Intelligence publication.
Water costs involve storage, insurance for hazardous chemicals, the actual process of treatment, training, and more. The ideal would be to purify our water without causing damaging impact to our health and to the environment, while providing economic viable solutions.
There are several emerging techniques to offer chemical-free water purification. Brian Butters, President of Purifics ES, Inc., talked about his company's chemical free treatment technologies. Purifics aims to provide solutions to purify, condition and manage water, while achieving economic and environmental advantage. The company developed technologies and processes to provide sustainable water purification without adding any substances to the water or the environment, resulting in pure water that is chemical free, waste free, and has no direct operating cost. Their Photo-Cat technology is a multi barrier process utilizes AOP, UV (ultra violet) and ceramic membranes to achieve sustainable economic and environmental advantages and it features no chemicals, no reject stream, simplified processes, no chemical oxidants, as well as lower capital investment than traditional systems. In addition, the Photo-CAT chemical is a fully automated process.
In a panel titled "Avenues of innovation in water management and treatment technology" technical and investment experts explored where we are headed in the water markets, what are the most promising approaches, how water tech starups are being valued, and where the opportunities are for further innovation and/or commercialization.
Moderatorated by Paul O’Callaghan, CEO, O2 ENVIRONMENTAL, INC., panelists were:
- Paul Gagliardo, M.P.H., P.E., Manager – Innovation Development, AMERICAN WATER
- Trevor Hill, President & CEO, GLOBAL WATER FATHOM
- Victor W. Hwang, Managing Director, T2VENTURE CAPITAL
- Arti Patel, Research & Advisory, Analyst, CLEAN TECH GROUP, LLC
- Laura Shenkar, Principal, THE ARTEMIS PROJECT
- Rafael Simon, Venture Partner, VANTAGEPOINT CAPITAL PARTNERS
In the water industry, we currently see established large organizations spin-off to smaller R&D and early stage companies to foster water tech innovations. Corporations like Siemens, can leverage their strenghts, business skills, partnerships, and corporate power to mentor and support these innovative smaller setups. In addition to corporate spin-offs, entrepreneurs are also presenting new ideas and bring forward new technologies.
One of the challenges that water tech innovators face is the fact that many clean technology investors are not familiar with the water landscape, its history, conventions, the challenges, and potential opportunities. Educating everyone in the process is an additional component entrepreneurs need to face.
More than any other clean tech industry, today the water sector isn't segmented into sub-sector expertise, therefore water players cover several roles and areas of proficiency. In the energy sector various components are handled by specific experts, for eample, smart grid experts, storage players, efficiency field, renewables, more. Currently, a water engineer in an early stage company needs to address multiple key areas and industries, like the food & beverage, buildings, manufacturing, land developers, utilities, etc., and have a comprehensive understanding of each aspect.
Another challenge is grappling with various public water agencies, a multitude of utilities modus operandi, water interest and environmental groups, and Federal and State policies. Some of the panelists noted out that the problem is not necessarily the regulations per se but the current business structure to sell and deploy new water technologies. In the US, most entrepreneurs focus on saving costs for utilities, which complicate the go-to-market process.
We are beginning to see technologies that were validated at the utility level. Scalability and mass implementations are still a challenge. Water price models reflect the cost of treatment, cost of compliance with the CWA and local regulations, and delivery. Water valuation in the US is not as a commodoty, a natural resource. Although most Americans enjoy an ongoing and reliable water supply, on a global scale we face growing scarcity for affordable clean water.
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
1. The 3rd Annual Water Tech Summit will continue on Wednesday and Thursday,
February 8 – 9, 2012. For more information about the Water Tech Summit, click here.
Infocast, a conference and event organizer, serves several markets in Healthcare, Real Estate, Water Technology, Renewable Energy & Fuels, Power Generation & Energy, Delivery, Carbon, Pharma Biotechnology, Infrastructure Investment, Oil & Natural Gas, and Gasification.
Check Infocast's website for additional events.
2. Purifics technologies - http://purifics.org/contact/index.html
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