Aquatech and Pani have entered a strategic partnership to optimize the economics of desalination with advanced digital solutions.
A global leader in desalination technology and services, Aquatech International selected Pani as their digital partner to augment their state-of-the-art LoWatt® technology with Pani’s digital twin & optimization software platform.
Pani’s AI Coach™ provides decision support to take current treatment plants to new efficiency standards, providing dynamic optimization to reduce energy, improve membrane health management, deliver effective pre-treatment, and reduce overall costs for RO systems. The partnership aims to augment Aquatech’s proprietary LoWatt® process with Pani’s hybrid approach of machine learning and first principle physio-chemical models in an effort to bring the industry standard of seawater desalination energy consumption to 2.7 kWh/m3. Current industry standard for conventional seawater desalination plants is 3.5 kWh/m3.
The partnership holds special promise as the treatment sector looks to leverage data connectivity and take current technologies to a new state of the art with advanced digital solutions.
“With superior process design combined with advanced machine learning, Aquatech can provide a solution that reliably meets treatment goals while minimizing energy consumption and O&M requirements in real-time. The further enhancement of the LoWatt® process in partnership with Pani enables us to better serve our customers and address the biggest pain points of desalination…. energy consumption and biofouling” says Ravi Chidambaran, Aquatech’s Chief Operating Officer.
Desalination plays a critical part of solving water security issues. Over 20,000 desalination facilities worldwide treat over 99 million m3 of water per day – which equals more than 26 billion US liquid gallons or almost 40,000 Olympic swimming pools – providing water for more than 300 million people globally.
While many more water scarce regions stand to benefit from desalination technologies, high energy requirements and costs have limited adoption, as energy alone can account for more than 50% of a desalination plant’s operating cost. Artificial intelligence technologies such as Pani’s AI Coach™ promise to bring greater efficiencies to current technologies, making desalination an affordable and robust option to meet the fresh water needs of many water scarce regions around the globe.
“By leveraging existing data, systems, and people paired with machine learning techniques, current desalination technologies can be lifted to new standards of efficiency – making water less expensive to produce and delivering affordable, climate resilient water to people and communities in water stressed regions,” said Pani CEO, Devesh Bharadwaj.
About Aquatech - Aquatech is a global leader in water purification technology for industrial and infrastructure markets with a focus on desalination, water recycle and reuse, and zero liquid discharge (ZLD). Aquatech has offices throughout North America, and has a significant presence worldwide through subsidiaries in Europe, the Middle East, India and China. Through its network and world-wide operations, Aquatech has successfully executed more than 1,500 water management projects in over 60 countries around the globe.
About Pani – Pani provides a cloud-based machine learning software platform to elevate the efficiency of industrial and city scale water treatment facilities. Pani's award-winning AI Coach™ aggregates and ingests plant data, then analyzes, visualizes, and instructs operators how to optimize their plant's performance.
