Wastewater firm on the crest of a wave

WITH the creation of a new bubble-less aeration system for wastewater treatment facilities, Athlone-based company OxyMem aims to revolutionise the industry globally and generate a turnover of €50m within five years.

While this may sound ambitious for a small start-up company which is about to sell its first system to Canada, managing director Wayne Byrne says it’s very achievable given that OxyMem is offering a system which can help solve the wastewater industry’s biggest headache, energy costs.

“Our system uses four times less energy than traditional aeration systems. Wastewater treatment uses 2% to 3% of global electricity — the OxyMem system can lower energy costs at treatment plants by 75%,” he says, adding that the global market for aeration systems in 2011 was worth €3.7bn and is predicted to grow to €6.4bn by 2020.

Established last July, OyxMem is now in discussions with a number of leading players in the wastewater industry. Currently employing a staff of 12, it is in the process of negotiating €2m in funding with a view to increasing staff numbers to 35 by the end of the year.

“Our aim, now, is to make the global players in this industry sit up and take notice,” says Mr Byrne, explaining that OxyMem plans to develop a network of reseller partners which will include aeration system suppliers and wastewater treatment systems providers. The end users are municipal wastewater facilities which make up 70% of the market. Industrial facilities account for the remaining 30%. “The biggest growth market is China and South America is also very significant,” Mr Byrne says.

“One sweet-spot, we have identified, is dealing with the challenge of treatment plants requiring extra capacity. OxyMem can be used to rapidly upgrade the plant capacity on the existing site because of the small footprint it occupies. It does not require any significant building works and can be up and running within days of delivery.”

The development of the OxyMem system comes as a result of 14 years of research into the use of membranes in wastewater treatment by Professor Eoin Casey, the company chairman, as well as Dr Eoin Syron — OxyMem’s chief technical director.

“Professor Casey produced the largest scale reactor, globally, using his patented membrane aerated biofilm reactor which allows oxygen to be transferred directly to bacteria, which break down wastewater,” says Mr Byrne, who adds that this novel membrane technology is capable of 99% efficiency in transferring oxygen, which is four times more efficient than traditional methods.

Enterprise Ireland provided funding for the research through University College Dublin since 2003, and in 2010, when Prof Casey had reached proof of concept stage, Enterprise Ireland introduced him and Dr Syron — through the Business Partners Programme — to Wayne Byrne, who has experience in the waste and wastewater industry.

Joining forces, the three men licensed the technology from UCD and set to work on developing it for commercial use, testing the new system at a South Dublin County Council landfill facility in Kildare and at Severn Trent, one of the UK’s largest water companies.

After the company was set up last year, OxyMem secured €250,000 in funding which came from the founders and from Enterprise Ireland which identified the company as a high potential start-up. This funding was used to employ a team of 12 and to set up operations at a 25,000 sq ft facility in Athlone in January.

The patented system is a standalone unit which costs €315,000 plus Vat. According to Mr Byrne: “It doesn’t require civil works to install it, it is ready to start processing wastewater when it is dropped off at site.”

At the end of January the company set up its first production line and is now increasing this to three lines. Plans are being made to ship a system to Canada and one to the UK in July. Mr Byrne says the aim for this year is to produce four systems which will act as showcases for the company’s technology.