The new release allows users to treat high contaminants or difficult streams or water efficiently and also recover product from the residue, the water consultant explained.
The unit, which features a fully equipped test laboratory, uses US-based New Logic Research's VSEP; it processes in one step what the common reverse-osmosis technology cannot, it said, even with pretreatment.
"Often piloted as a last resort on very contaminated streams, VSEP is typically the most effective, simple and easy to operate," Talbot general manager Claire Lipsett said.
Lipsett added that the mobile unit was ideal for those sites looking to defer costs when their brine storage is reaching capacity. At a coal mine in Mpumalanga, South Africa, where the company has trialled the technology, it is projecting daily brine production will be cut in half - allowing for the mine's future expansion and negating overflow risk for the site.
"It also substantially enhances the recovery of high-quality water for use in site activities, as a substitute for municipal supply or be taken up by water-stressed local communities," she noted, pointing out that refineries also benefit from the additional quantities of ultra-fine particles that can be recovered from waste streams and returned to the process.
With live data capabilities, the mobile unit can allow its users to develop in-house technical and financial models demonstrating VSEP's potential for any operation; in some cases, it can aid in developing full plant designs and play a role in business cases looking a decade into the future.
"Nothing beats live data - on your site, on your water. Potential customers … have the assurance that the design is based on their specific conditions," Lipsett said.
"We're able to characterise the streams of interest, optimise the full plant design, gain firm details on operating costs and save the client money by factoring in unknowns. In short, operations can make a ‘yes' or ‘no' call, remove the risk and maximise the benefits of investing in innovative technology."
