Energy Recovery, Inc. (Energy Recovery) is a global leader in energy efficiency technology.
The company designs and manufactures high-performance solutions that generate increase energy efficiency, and reduce carbon emissions across several industries.
Pressure Exchanger Technology
The company’s pressure exchanger technology platform is at the heart of many of its solutions. The company is designed to efficiently capture and transfer pressure energy, making commercial and industrial processes...
Energy Recovery, Inc. (Energy Recovery) is a global leader in energy efficiency technology.
The company designs and manufactures high-performance solutions that generate increase energy efficiency, and reduce carbon emissions across several industries.
Pressure Exchanger Technology
The company’s pressure exchanger technology platform is at the heart of many of its solutions. The company is designed to efficiently capture and transfer pressure energy, making commercial and industrial processes more efficient and environmentally sustainable, thereby lowering costs, saving energy, and minimizing emissions.
The company’s pressure exchanger technology acts like a fluid piston, efficiently transferring energy between high- and low-pressure liquid or gas through continuously rotating ducts. Key to the operation of a pressure exchanger is the micron-level clearances between the rotor and the pressure exchanger’s stationary components, including the sleeve and the end covers. Fluid circulating within this clearance acts as a lubricated bearing, minimizing frictional losses and wear for an extremely efficient exchange of pressure energy.
The original product application of the company’s pressure exchanger technology, the PX Pressure Exchanger (‘PX’) energy recovery device was a major contributor to the advancement of seawater reverse osmosis desalination (‘SWRO’) globally, addressing ‘energy intensity’, which is a key pain point for the industry. The PX establishes a value proposition by reducing energy use by up to 60% in SWRO facilities. It is this significant savings that allowed SWRO to supplant thermal desalination as desalination technology of choice. The PX, which uses no electricity, operates at up to 98% efficiency and is designed to operate with no scheduled maintenance. The company continues to push the boundaries of its core technology to handle different operating environments and industrial applications, such as wastewater and carbon dioxide (CO2) refrigeration, and deliver reliable, high-performance solutions that generate increase energy efficiency for its customers.
Desalination
Worldwide seawater desalination plants using the company’s products produce over 35 million cubic meters of water per day (‘m3/day’).
Seawater Reverse Osmosis Desalination: Rather than dissipating or ‘wasting’ the pressure energy from the discharge brine, the company’s PX, the most adopted energy recovery solution, can transfer the pressure energy from the high-pressure discharge stream directly to a portion of the low-pressure filtered feed water stream, thereby reducing the amount of flow required by the main high-pressure process pumps, which are the largest consumers of power within the SWRO process. The company’s highly efficient technology can recycle this pressure energy at peak efficiencies up to 98%. As a result, the company’s PXs have helped make seawater desalination an economically viable and more sustainable option in the production of potable water.
Brackish Water Reverse Osmosis Desalination: Due to the lower cost and available pressure energy involved, the company’s low pressure PX and hydraulic turbochargers generally have characteristics more applicable to the brackish process. Seawater desalination has been the company’s primary market for revenue generation, and brackish water applications are an emerging area of potential growth. These markets range from small, decentralized desalination plants, such as those used in cruise ships and resorts, to large-scale project (‘megaproject’) desalination plants, defined as those which produce over 50 thousand m3/day. The large-scale greenfield market has been the key market for the company’s water business and represents projects that are typically public in nature and involve a formal tendering process The company works directly with the project bidders, generally large project developers, engineering, procurement, and construction firms (‘EPC’ firm), end-users, and industry consultants, to specify the company’s products prior to the project being awarded, where possible. Once the project is awarded to an EPC firm, the company’s normal sales process ensues.
Wastewater
A variety of RO technologies may be utilized in the wastewater applications where the company’s energy recovery solutions are applicable. Such processes are typically multi-staged, with each stage increasing in pressure as the wastewater is filtered to recover clean water from a wastewater stream and concentrate pollutants to a level where they can be economically utilized or safely disposed, rather than discharged into the environment. The company’s energy recovery solutions, such as its hydraulic turbochargers, low-pressure PX, and its Ultra High-Pressure PX, can be applied to each of these stages.
Water Treatment Solutions
Pressure Exchangers
The company’s line of pressure exchangers are high efficiency isobaric energy recovery devices made of a ceramic cartridge supported by a highly efficient hydrodynamic and hydrostatic bearing system. Models in this product family are designed for use in a variety of reverse osmosis systems within the water treatment industry, including seawater and brackish desalination, and wastewater treatment.
High-Pressure PX Pressure Exchanger
The company’s highly efficient PX Pressure Exchanger family of energy recovery devices delivers unmatched energy savings for water treatment systems. The company offers a variety of sizes defined by the flow and pressure requirements of the system ranging as low as 20 and up to 400 gallons per minute (‘gpm’) (as low as 4.5 and up to 90.8 cubic meters of water per hour (‘m3/h’)) per device at pressures between 400-1200 pounds per square inch (‘psi’) (28-84 kilograms per square centimeter (‘bar’)); however, the company’s customers can design their energy recovery systems to achieve unlimited capacities by installing an array of PXs in parallel.
Small and large desalination projects around the world rely on the company’s range of PXs to achieve optimal operations and maximum energy savings, and the scalability and versatility of the company’s PX can achieve similar success in the emerging wastewater market it is targeting.
Ultra High-Pressure PX
The company’s Ultra High-Pressure PX energy recovery device, which it believes, addresses key challenges, such as energy intensity and environmental impacts associated with treating wastewater in a variety of water treatment applications. Designed with the pressure exchanger technology that powers the company’s flagship high pressure PX, the Ultra High-Pressure PX, functions similarly to its PX but can withstand higher pressures. The company offers a variety of sizes defined by the flow and pressure requirements of the system ranging as low as 10 and up to 250 gpm (or as low as 2.3 and up to 56.8 m3/h) per device at pressures between 1200-1800 psi (84-126 bar); however, by installing an array of PXs in parallel, its customers can design their energy recovery system to achieve unlimited capacities.
While reverse osmosis adoption in wastewater treatment is growing, the company’s Ultra High-Pressure PX can help accelerate further adoption of reverse osmosis in the growing zero and minimum liquid discharge markets by enhancing RO’s affordability and efficiency compared to thermal treatment options, similar to the impact of its PX in the seawater desalination market.
Low-Pressure PX
Products in this family are ideal for municipal and industrial potable water reuse applications that deploy low-pressure RO stages such as municipal wastewater reuse applications. The company offers a variety of sizes defined by the flow and pressure requirements of the system ranging as low as 30 and up to 260 gpm (or as low as 6.8 and up to 59.0 m3/h) per device at pressures between 80-400 psi (6-28 bar); however, by installing an array of PXs in parallel, its customers can design their energy recovery system to achieve unlimited capacities.
Pumps and Turbochargers
The company offers high-pressure centrifugal pumps designed to complement its energy recovery devices for a wide range of RO plant capacities and applications.
Hydraulic Turbochargers
The company’s AT and LPT hydraulic turbochargers are high efficiency centrifugal energy recovery devices used in low-pressure brackish and high-pressure seawater desalination systems and wastewater treatment markets. The company’s turbocharger product lines are highly efficient with state-of-the-art engineering in a compact configuration. With custom-designed hydraulics that allow for optimum performance over a wide range of operating conditions, the company’s turbocharger technology offers solutions to capital cost constrained single-stage RO applications, inter-stage boost applications typically found in brackish water desalination and some wastewater treatment systems. The company’s hydraulic turbochargers deliver substantial savings, operational benefits, and ease of integration into systems.
Pumps
The company manufactures and/or supplies specialized high-pressure feed and circulation pumps for only a portion of the markets served by its energy recovery solutions. The company’s high-pressure feed pumps are designed to pressurize the membrane feed flow and overcome the osmotic pressure requirements of the feed water resulting in the production of desalinated water. The company’s high-pressure circulation pumps are designed to circulate and control the high-pressure flow through its PX and to compensate for small pressure losses across the membranes, PX and associated process piping in many desalination and wastewater applications.
Sales and Marketing
The company’s strategically located direct sales force offers its products through capital sale to the company’s customers around the world. The company maintains a sales and service footprint in strategic territories to handle desalination activities, such as in the U.S., China, India, Latin America, Spain, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and countries in North Africa, allowing rapid response to its customers’ needs. In addition, the company is expanding its team to handle the growing wastewater from industrial plants in the U.S., China, India, South America, and Taiwan. The company’s team consists of individuals with many years of desalination and wastewater treatment industry expertise. Aligned to the geographic breadth of the company’s and potential future customers, the company’s product marketing approach includes a strategic presence at water industry events across various regions. In addition, the company leverages its industry and market intelligence to develop new solutions and services that can be adopted by the company’s growing customer base.
Project Channels
The company separates its Water segment sales into three distinct channels that are related to financial, other commercial, and technical aspects of the projects. The company identifies these sales channels as megaproject (‘MPD’), original equipment manufacturers (‘OEM’) and aftermarket (‘AM’).
Megaproject
MPD customers are major firms that develop, design, build, own and/or operate large-scale desalination plants with capacities greater than 13.2 million gallons/day (50 thousand m3/day). A majority of the company’s water treatment revenue comes from this channel. The company’s MPD customers have the required desalination expertise to engineer, undertake procurement for, construct, and sometimes own and operate, large-scale desalination plants. As such, MPD customers most often select its PX, which the company offers market-leading value with the highest technological and economic benefit. The company works with its MPD customers to specify and optimize the company’s PX solutions for their plant designs.
Original Equipment Manufacturer
OEM customers are companies that supply equipment, packaged systems, and various operating and maintenance solutions for small- to medium-sized desalination and wastewater plants utilized by commercial and industrial entities, and national, state, and local municipalities worldwide. The company sells to its OEM customers a broad set of its products, including its PX, hydraulic turbochargers, high-pressure pumps, circulation booster pumps, and associated services. As it relates to desalination and wastewater OEM projects, these projects consist of plants processing up to 13.2 million gallons/day (50 thousand m3/day), such as those located in hotels and resorts, power plants, cruise ships, agricultural sectors, local and other municipal sites, and industrial facilities. In addition, these OEM customers purchase the company’s solutions for mobile, decentralized ‘quick water’ or emergency water solutions. The company sells not only its PX, but also the company’s hydraulic turbochargers, which offer a lower cost alternative to its PX.
Aftermarket
Aftermarket customers are desalination or wastewater plant owners and/or operators who can utilize the company’s technology to upgrade or keep their plant running optimally, and usually have its solutions installed and in operation. The company provides spare parts, repair services, field services and various commissioning activities. The company leverages its industry expertise in supporting the company’s existing installed base to ensure that its energy recovery solutions are being operated effectively and efficiently to maximize plant availability and overall profitability of the facility operations, as required by the company’s industry partners and customers.
Seasonality
The company often experiences substantial fluctuations in desalination or wastewater revenue from quarter-to-quarter and from year-to-year (year ended December 2024) primarily due to the timing and execution of its MPD shipments.
Emerging Technologies
The company is leveraging its pressure exchanger technology platform to develop new product applications and diversify into new industries. The company continues to push the limits of what its pressure exchanger technology can do, which it believes will unlock new commercial opportunities in the future.
CO2
The company’s PX G1300, which uses proven pressure exchanger technology to improve CO2-based refrigeration system performance, can contribute to solving this challenge and help make CO2-based refrigeration more economically viable in a broader range of climates.
PX G1300
The company’s refrigeration-focused product leverages its existing ceramics, material science, and manufacturing expertise. The PX G1300 can reduce the energy consumption and operating costs of CO2-based refrigeration systems in a broad range of operating conditions. The company sees this as potentially a significant accelerator for adoption of CO2-based refrigeration system globally as its PX G1300 could eventually alter the standard refrigeration system architecture by reducing costs for end users, such as grocery stores. The company designed the PX G1300 to be integrated into new or existing CO2-based refrigeration systems. The PX G1300 can integrate with any existing rack controller and is easy to operate and maintain. The simplicity of installation and the ease of operations could encourage the adoption of this new technology.
Sales and Marketing
There is a significant potential market for the PX G1300 in a variety of channels, such as supermarket chains and cold storage facilities. The build of these commercial and industrial refrigeration systems is large enough and demands enough flow of CO2 refrigerant to warrant the use of the company’s device, which implies any system 80 kilowatt in size or greater.
In understanding the market for the PX G1300, the company has identified three major value propositions:
Energy Savings and Emissions Reduction.
The PX G1300 recycles the high-pressure energy of a CO2 system by compressing a portion of the gas flow for ‘free. This ‘free’ compression provided by the PX G1300 allows the main electrical refrigeration compressor to work less to keep the refrigeration system at the same temperature. In this way, the company’s PX G1300 contributes to lower energy consumption and lower costs by reducing the number of cycles the main compressor operates, and thereby lower emissions in a CO2 refrigeration system.
Channels and Customers
CO2 sales are reported under the company’s OEM sales channel. This includes direct sales to commercial or industrial customers, such as supermarket chains, cold storage facilities, and other industrial users, and sales to intermediaries, such as refrigeration system installers or refrigeration OEMs, to whom it sells the PX G1300 and associated services for inclusion in these customers’ new installation or retrofit of existing systems.
In 2024, the company continued to increase its commercialization efforts in the U.S. and in Europe. Initially, the company sold the PX G1300 to a variety of customers, such as directly to an end user supermarket chain and OEMs. After partnering with OEMs, the company has made tremendous progress towards full commercialization.
Intellectual Property
The company has registered the following trademarks with the United States Patent and Trademark office: ‘ERI,’ ‘PX,’ ‘PX Pressure Exchanger,’ ‘Pressure Exchanger,’ ‘Ultra High-Pressure PX,’ ‘PX PowerTrain,’ ‘PX G1300,’ and the Energy Recovery logo. The company has also applied for and received registrations in international trademark offices.
History
Energy Recovery, Inc. was founded in 1992. The company was incorporated in Delaware in 1992.
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