Electro-Ceramic Desalination

First and Only Ceramic Membrane Capable of Desalination

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Electro-Ceramic Desalination: Level Up Your Industrial Wastewater Treatment

Membrion’s cutting-edge Electro-Ceramic Desalination (ECD) process is used to selectively remove dissolved ions, such as salts, metals, and minerals, from challenging wastewater streams. It concentrates them into a small volume for recovery or disposal. Dissolved ions are often the source of regulatory compliance issues and the cause of equipment failure due to mineral scaling. Removing solely the problematic ions ensures a tailored approach so that facilities only pay to treat what matters.

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Membrion’s Ceramic Desalination Membrane

  • Is protected by more than 40 patents
  • Is mass produced in the U.S. through a roll-to-roll processes
  • Leverages molecule-sized pores to selectively remove ions
  • Maintains durability in extreme wastewater conditions
  • Removes dissolved and charged salts, minerals & metals
  • Are leveraged across many applications and industries

The Electro-Ceramic Desalination Process

a low-pressure process

Electro-Ceramic Desalination (ECD) is a low-pressure process used to continuously remove ions from wastewater and concentrate them in a separate, low-volume stream for recovery or disposal. ECD modules are composed of positive & negative electrodes, cation and anion selective ceramic membranes, and mesh spacers.

a driving force

Wastewater is fed into the ECD module, where an electric field is used to create a driving force that attracts ions toward the electrodes. Positive & negative charged ions are moved out of the wastewater and through charge-selective ceramic membranes before recombining in the concentrate stream where they no longer move.

continuously moving ions

As the wastewater flows parallel to the membrane surface, ions are continuously moved from the feed into the concentrate stream. The feed wastewater typically flows through the modules once, but the concentrate stream is re-circulated to minimize the volume.

tunable removal

The length of time the wastewater resides in the ECD module as it flows through directly impacts the level of ion removal (i.e., tunable removal), which ensures that facilities always treat their wastewater to the exact level that’s needed. More modules can be used in parallel to increase the wastewater flow rate and in series to remove more ions.

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    Why Use Membrion’s Ceramic Desalination Membranes?

    Most wastewater treatment solutions are “one-size-fits-most” leaving your team to figure out the specifics of how to adapt existing infrastructure to changing environmental goals, treatment capacity shortages, and new regulations. Our retrofit solution is highly customizable to solve for the exact challenges you’re currently facing.

    Unique Capabilities

    • Handle “harsh” conditions with minimal-to-no pre-treatment
    • Self-clean and operate with minimal interaction from the facility
    • Reduce the volume of salts, metals, and minerals by 3x - 50x
    • Fit into small spaces based on compact design
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    Withstand the Harshest environments

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    Concentrated acids 

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    Oxidizers

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    Small particles (<10 um)
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    Chelators
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    Organic & biological foulants

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    High silica & scaling minerals
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    Chlorine
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    Residual solvents
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    Limitations

    Our technology is highly versatile and can provide many wastewater treatment solutions, however, it is not universally applicable.
    Here’s when we raise a red flag:

    • Projects where the water could be reasonably treated with a traditional stand-alone membrane technology (e.g., reverse osmosis). We deliver a lot of value and are more economical than many solutions, but we aren’t the least expensive solution on the market.
    • Applications that require pH > 8. We can adjust pH down, but our silica membranes are not designed for alkaline or caustic operations.
    • Situations where particles, organics, silica, and/or other non-ionized molecules must also be removed. We only remove ions and so removing other contaminants requires complementary technologies which our integration partners can help with.
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    Where to Start

    Take the first step toward creating your customized wastewater solution by contacting us online. A knowledgeable member of our team will connect with you, learn more about your unique requirements, and help assess if Membrion’s electro-ceramic desalination technology is the right fit for your needs.

    “We complete on-site feasibility studies before we sell anything.”

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    Heavy Metals

    Our extensive piloting studies prove that our solutions are versatile, can reduce existing operating expenses, and can solve some of the most challenging issues in heavy metal wastewater treatment.