Lack of fresh water and polluted wastewater is a huge and growing challenge across the world, not least in developing countries and emerging market. This is also the case in India, which has led the national authorities to tighten the wastewater regulations and introduce guidelines for Zero Liquid Discharge (ZLD) for major water consuming industries like paper and pulp, pharmaceuticals, chemicals refineries, textile, tanneries, food and beverage, etc.
To comply with the new regulations and ensure consistent water availability for their production facilities, the companies within these sectors need to clean their wastewater and recycle as much as possible in their production. This has opened a new market for developing, installing and servicing industrial effluent treatment plants as turnkey solutions.
The Indian company Rochem Separation Systems has developed modern and energy-efficient wastewater recycling and ZLD solutions that can recover 75 to 80 per cent of the water from wastewater. The plants use energy efficient pumps and components from proven suppliers like the Danish companies Grundfos and Danfoss, which reduces the energy consumption further.
Danish risk capital to scale up business
To scale up sales and fast-track the adoption of wastewater recycling solutions by the industry, Rochem Separation Systems needs capital-strong partners, who can finance the procurement of plants that can be provided on operating lease/BOOT basis to individual companies.
Consequently, the Danish Climate Investment Fund, managed by IFU, has entered into a joint venture with Rochem to establish the company Roserve, which will contribute to the expansion of wastewater recycling solutions in India and reduce the use of fresh water, energy consumption and cost for industrial companies.
– We are very pleased with our investment because it greatly benefits the environment and can provide a fair return to the investors, said Deepa Hingorani, Vice President for South Asia at IFU.
“The economic advantages of reclaimed water as a climate-proof source of water supply across industries is becoming increasingly compelling. On the back of local financial institutions’ reluctance to finance innovative business models, we are pleased to team up with DCIF to drive our expansion.”
Prayas Goel, Managing Director of Rochem
The lease/BOOT model is based on Roserve handling the operation as well as the maintenance of the individual plants. The user industry typically pays a fixed and variable monthly charge based on volume of water recycled to cover the capex cost and operations cost, respectively.
International sales ahead
Roserve has started operations in India and has to date set up over 30 plants within the country. But the potential of the business goes beyond India, because more and more developing countries and emerging markets will gradually tighten their regulation on wastewater and increase the follow-up on compliance. Consequently, Roserve will start looking to expand its business to other countries.