News Release

Reclamation invests $1.6 million in nine technologies that focus on improving water desalination and treatment

Projects focus on reducing costs, energy requirements and environmental impacts of treating water

Grant and Award Announcement

Bureau of Reclamation

DWPR Pilot Scale Projects Receive $1.6 million

image: Storage tanks holding brackish groundwater may be used to test the pilot projects. view more 

Credit: Bureau of Reclamation

The Bureau of Reclamation chose nine recipients to receive $1.6 million in Desalination and Water Purification Research Program funding. This financial assistance will allow project sponsors to collaborate with Reclamation to design, construct, install and test their process.

"Desalination can provide communities in the Western United States a new source of usable water," said Chief Engineer David Raff. "Reclamation is seeking to make desalination more affordable, so it can be made available for use within more communities."

This two-stage pitch-to-pilot funding opportunity concluded this fall; applicants pitched their innovative and industry disruptive technology to desalination experts. The nine recipients selected to receive funding and develop a pilot-scale process are:

  • Ayon, LLC (Virginia), $192,000
  • GreenBlu, Inc. (New Jersey), $200,000
  • Interphase Materials, Inc. (Pennsylvania), $200,000
  • OceanSpace, LLC (Florida), $110,920
  • Orange County Water District (California), $102,700
  • ORB XYZ, Inc. (California), $200,000
  • University of North Carolina at Charlotte (North Carolina), $172,179
  • University of Utah (Utah), $200,000
  • Waste Salt Technologies, LLC (California), $200,000

The Desalination and Water Purification Research program supports President Biden's Executive Order on Tackling the Climate Crisis at Home and Abroad. The program seeks to invest in developing advanced water treatment technologies to expand access to otherwise unusable water resources.

To learn more about this program and see complete descriptions of the research projects, please visit www.usbr.gov/research/dwpr.


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