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A technique to eliminate forever chemicals in drinking water has been awarded funding to be developed for use in the water sector.
The method for an alternative to chlorination that could remove persistent, ubiquitous substances found in all water sources won £450,000 in the innovation fund set up by Ofwat.
The Water Discovery Challenge aims to accelerate the development and adoption of promising new innovations for the water sector.
It was one of ten entries awarded a portion of £4.5 million to scale up ideas from concept or pilot to an at-scale solution to common problems shared in the water sector.
The method disinfects water at a lower cost than chlorine using cold plasma, which also targets some forever chemicals present in the water source.
The process, put forward by Anamad, uses an electrical impulse to treat water without adding chemicals and with low energy usage.
“Non-thermal plasma is a low-maintenance, affordable process designed to clean water by eliminating persistent and emerging pollutants from any source of water without generating a large carbon footprint. There is no waste created in the process and it ensures forever chemicals are removed before they enter the wider environment,” chief executive of Anamad, Matthew Illsley, said.
Other entries awarded funding include another alternative to chlorination that uses a hydrogen-based chemical to clean water, which generates just water and oxygen as a by-product thus making it a cleaner, more cost-and energy-efficient approach to filtration.
Freeox, the organisation behind it, said upscaling and commercialising its technology has the potential to transform water treatment globally.
Elsewhere, Acquire was awarded funding to develop its machine-learning analysis tool to speed up water quality incident reporting. The software can identify potential solutions and interventions if it identifies issues with sample quality.
Projects awarded a share of the funding pot also include an initiative to generate green electricity from wastewater using a process that also destroys greenhouse gases.
Over the next six months, each winner will be supported to further the development of their solutions with mentoring and an opportunity to pitch to investors and partners in the sector.
Ofwat launched the innovation fund at the start of the current asset management period (AMP7) in 2020 to encourage innovation in a traditionally risk-averse sector. So far, £110 million has been distributed to develop 77 projects. The regulator said it will expand the fund for AMP8 to £300 million.
The two streams of the fund are the Discovery Challenge, which is open to any entrants, and the Breakthrough Challenge, which is open to entrants from within the sector only.
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