Filtralite can increase filtration rates and reduce the necessity to build new treatment plants
Water pollution is an increasingly urgent issue worldwide. Filtralite’s high-porosity filter media can retain more contaminants, allowing for greater water filtration efficiency. Geir Norden, R&D Expert at Filtralite, discusses how this innovative technology is enhancing water treatment, and supporting sustainable water management.
Water pollution is a growing global concern, driven by factors such as rapid urbanization and agricultural intensification. In many regions, water utilities face the challenging and resource-intensive task of treating and purifying contaminated water, which can be costly. Filtralite, with its unique porosity, provides a solution by retaining and absorbing more contaminants, enabling larger volumes of water to be filtered through the same filter volume. Geir Norden, Research and Development Expert at Filtralite, discussed with SWM the advantages and innovative technology behind this forward-looking filter media.
Can you describe your career, your current role, and your level of involvement with Filtralite?
I am from Norway and began working for Leca, Europe's leading company in expanded clay, in 1995, coinciding with the initial application of Filtralite. Throughout my career, I have been responsible for R&D and have been deeply involved in the ongoing development of Filtralite.
What is Filtralite’s position within the Saint-Gobain Group?
Saint-Gobain Group is a leading company in building materials, with a strong focus on high-performance products that provide our customers with comfort and security. Filtralite aligns perfectly with this mission. As a high-quality filter media, it is engineered to reduce operational costs in the filtration process and is built to last.
How does your team ensure that its innovations meet the needs of the market and consumers?
Filtralite offers a range of solutions for water treatment, including Filtralite Pure, Filtralite Clean, and Filtralite Air. These diverse products enable us to work with drinking water globally, meeting all necessary certifications, as well as with wastewater and even air filtration.
Our sales team is continuously expanding their knowledge of different markets and enhancing their expertise to anticipate future needs. We strive to tailor our solutions as closely as possible to the specific requirements of our customers. For example, challenges vary by country — some need to enhance water quality, while others focus on increasing water production. A common goal among many is reducing water consumption.
What are the biggest challenges you face when developing new products or technologies?
We strive to tailor our solutions to the specific requirements of our customers, whether to enhance water quality, or increase water production
The biggest challenge we face in developing new products is that we export Filtralite worldwide, including to Australia, South America, and South Korea, where there are diverse methods for treating both drinking water and wastewater. To address this, we have developed different filter material particle densities and sizes in our products to accommodate a wide range of filtration processes. This flexibility allows us to effectively filter various types of water and tackle many forms of water pollution.
How do you manage collaboration with external partners, such as universities or other companies, on R&D projects?
We have significant collaborations with external partners. Firstly, we are working with other companies to test our products beyond our production site. Additionally, many of our customers conduct their own internal testing in their laboratories, and we are proud to have results from partners like Suez, Aqualia, and Saur. Finally, we are collaborating with universities to support PhD students in researching filtration media and methods to reduce energy consumption during the filtration process. These studies are available directly on Filtralite's website, www.filtralite.com.
What types of pollutants do Filtralite’s solutions remove and how effectively?
Filtralite® Filter media is a lightweight filter media used for both physical and biological water filtration, similar to traditional sand filters. While the filter setup and processes are alike, Filtralite offers significant advantages in filter output. It provides the same treatment process as sand but consistently outperforms it in water quality, filtration velocity – which can be improved by 50% – and head loss across all projects. Filtralite achieves better filtration performance, with extended durations between backwashes, up to 8 times more than sand. Additionally, our media is effective in removing iron, manganese, ammonia, TOC, arsenic, and more. In the plant of Jäniksenlinna, close to Helsinki, sand has been replaced by Filtralite; the performances are similar on iron and manganese removal, but the filters are backwashing every week and not every two days.
Many of our customers conduct their own internal testing, and we are proud to have results from partners like Suez, Aqualia, and Saur
Demographic pressure increases the use of chemicals to remove pollutants such as ammonium. We had a project in the Philippines, some years ago, where the drinking water plant of Putatán II, close to Manilla, had issues with ammonium. After doing some tests with Filtralite, they changed their process from chlorination to aerated biofiltration. Due to the concentration, they would have needed 15 tonnes of chemicals every day. Such a quantity brings high costs for the plant and makes it difficult to manage such a product. Filtralite reached the same expected level of ammonium without chemicals. The transition from a chemical approach to a biological approach enables a massive reduction in operation costs and decreases the impact of chemicals on the natural environment.
What benefits does Filtralite offer water utilities compared to other companies in the market?
Our media offers higher porosity, around 61% of voids, which enhances its ability to capture and retain more suspended solids in the water, and promotes greater bacterial activity per volume of filter media. In contrast, sand is characterized by its rounder shape and smoother surface, which results in lower porosity and reduced water cleaning efficiency. Simply put, sand cannot capture all the residues present in the water as well. As a result, our filter media requires less frequent backwashing, leading to fewer filter stops and significant savings in both water and energy used for this process. Additionally, our media allows for the filtration of more water in the same amount of time, providing our clients the option to deliver more water or reduce operational costs by using fewer filters.
How do you integrate environmental and ethical considerations into your R&D activities?
Saint-Gobain Group’s strategy involves considering a CO2 price for each project. This approach drives us to find innovative solutions to reduce CO2 emissions at every stage, from production to transport. In production, we're making strides by replacing coal with biomass, reducing CO2 emissions by 50%. For transport, we prioritize intermodal options whenever possible, reducing reliance on lorries by using boats and trains, which have lower CO2 emissions. Additionally, the lightweight nature of our media allows for larger volumes per lorry, further decreasing CO2 emissions during transport.
Our product not only reduces water consumption and the energy required to move that water, but also enhances plant performance, enabling smaller plant sizes and lower capital expenditures, which in turn reduces CO2 emissions. We are committed to maintaining this sustainability mindset throughout the entire lifecycle of our product.
Where in the world is Filtralite active? Could you tell us a bit about the projects
you are working on?
As I mentioned earlier, we distribute Filtralite worldwide, and we're proud to produce a product that meets global needs. We have a presence on every continent except Antarctica.
In desalination plants, Filtralite extends the lifespan of RO membranes and allows for higher levels of suspended solids in the inlet water
We've also achieved excellent results with desalination plants Filtralite extends the lifespan of membranes in the reverse osmosis process and allows for higher levels of suspended solids in the inlet water, enabling the plant to continue producing water even during heavy rainfall. We have been part of a project for some years in Beni Saf, in Algeria. In their process, the plant stopped production when the suspended solids rate was over 25 mg/l with sand in the inlet water. Since they installed Filtralite, they can produce even when the suspended solids rate is up to 40 mg/l. They even managed to continue the production, partially, with 70 mg/l of suspended solids in the inlet water. For the plant manager, the improvement is massive as they are not forced to stop production.
Population growth, strict water treatment regulations and the growing demand for new water resources are some of the factors driving the water and wastewater treatment market’s growth. How do you see the water and wastewater sector evolving in the next decade?
Rapid urbanization heightens the need to enhance the production capacity of existing water treatment plants within cities. Filtralite can increase filtration rates and reduce the necessity to build new facilities. In many regions around the world, where water scarcity makes every drop precious, Filtralite plays a crucial role in conserving this vital resource.
The growing demand for food pushes farmers to use more fertilizers which end up often in the water. Filtralite has good results in removing phosphorus. In the wastewater plant of Kakolanmäki, in Finland, close to Turku, Filtralite removes 50% of the total phosphorus and more than 80% of nitrogen pollution in the water. Furthermore, the backwashing efficiently remove all particles caught in Filtralite’s voids.
A large portion of operating costs for drinking water systems can be for energy. How can Filtralite contribute to energy savings?
Our solution requires significantly less backwashing, a process that involves rinsing the filter media with air and/or water, which typically consumes substantial water and energy. By drastically reducing the frequency of this operation, we minimize the water and energy needed for pumping and water disposal. Due to the porosity, we are holding back between 3 and 4 times more suspended solids, so we are decreasing every year the cost of backwashes by 3 to 4. As I mentioned previously, all suspended solids caught during the filtration cycle, are released during the backwash, to preserve the filtration capacities.
Filtralite has resulted in a 100% satisfaction rate among our customers; no one has ever expressed a desire to revert to their previous solution
Additionally, our media allows for a higher volume of water to be filtered, further reducing energy consumption over the same period. This solution has resulted in a 100% satisfaction rate among our customers; no one has ever expressed a desire to revert to their previous solution after using our product. Furthermore, the average Return on Investment is under three years — sometimes even just a few months — while the material itself has a lifespan exceeding 20 years.
How can Filtralite help reduce the carbon footprint of water treatment?
Filtralite can significantly reduce the carbon footprint of both new and existing water treatment plants. The use of Filtralite® Filter media requires less energy to process the same amount of water. For new plants, this allows for a design with a smaller overall footprint. Currently, the main cost associated with water prices is the energy required for production and distribution. Especially in this period of energy market uncertainty,
we're proud to offer a solution that consumes less energy. In many countries, where energy is still largely generated from fossil fuels, this translates to a reduced carbon footprint for water treatment plants. Additionally, our media enables higher filtration speeds, allowing designers to build fewer filters, thereby reducing the need for concrete, equipment, and other resources.