ENV · Water & wastewater
Industrial wastewater treatment and process water systems
Pre-treatment, main treatment, post-treatment and sludge — engineered as one line. Industrial and municipal plants, seawater desalination, and water reuse designed to cut both intake and discharge.
Note
A dedicated water site is on the way
Water and wastewater has outgrown a section. The deeper technical library — process data sheets, selection guides, application notes by industry — is being built as its own site. Everything on this page is the current, complete offering, and each technology already has a full page behind it.
What we deliver
Four areas of activity
Glorinda provides solutions across four areas of water and wastewater treatment. Most projects touch more than one.
Industrial water and wastewater treatment plants
Complete plants and individual stages for process water, effluent treatment and reuse, across every industry we serve.
Municipal wastewater treatment plants
Sewage treatment design, capacity upgrades, membrane bioreactor conversions and optimisation of plants running at their limit.
Seawater desalination plants
Reverse osmosis desalination with pretreatment sized against the actual intake quality, not a nominal seawater analysis.
Direct lithium extraction
High-efficiency sorbents, simulated moving bed systems, calcium and boron removal and Li/Na separation resin units, with EPC services covering design, supply, installation and training.
Process
The treatment line, stage by stage
Glorinda designs processes around individual requirements, but every line resolves into the same four stages. Getting the balance between them right is the single largest lever on both capital and operating cost.
Effective pre-treatment reduces cost in the main treatment stages and improves overall process efficiency. On a zero liquid discharge line, pre-treatment decides how many evaporators you have to buy — which is why we design it first.
Process diagram
Pre-treatment → main treatment → post-treatment → sludge
Reserved for a static block-flow diagram showing the four stages with the technology options available at each, and the recycle streams between them.
Static process diagram — final artwork to be supplied.
Pre-treatment
Physical, chemical and biological removal ahead of the main stage. Minimum liquid discharge using conventional RO, closed circuit RO and high-efficiency RO; membrane and filtration technologies including ultrafiltration, nanofiltration, ceramic and silicon carbide membranes; anaerobic membrane bioreactors for high-strength organic load; and adsorbent systems for COD, suspended solids, heavy metals, cyanide, pesticides, silica, ammoniacal nitrogen and colour.
Main treatment and recovery
Where the water balance is closed. MLD achieves around 85% recovery on membranes alone and is a cost-effective alternative to thermal evaporation. Where discharge must reach zero, ZLD adds evaporation, crystallisation and drying, producing water with total dissolved solids below 100 ppm — clean enough for cooling towers and boiler feed.
Post-treatment
High-quality water production for specific duties. Ion exchange and mixed bed systems drawn from Glorinda Resins' catalogue of more than 200 resin types; electrodeionization for continuous, chemical-free ultrapure water; and advanced oxidation using hydrogen peroxide generated on site.
Sludge management
Dewatering, drying and incineration, in that order, each stage removing moisture and therefore haulage. Thermal hydrolysis before anaerobic digestion raises biogas yield, produces a hygienic digested sludge and cuts residual volume.
Technology index
Technologies
Every route below has a full technology page: what problem it solves, how the process works, where it is used, and the questions we will ask before quoting.
Residues
Sludge management
The better you treat wastewater, the more sludge you produce. On plants near urban areas that becomes an environmental problem as well as a cost, and it is usually the line item nobody modelled properly at tender.
Municipal. Primary and biological sludge from sewage works, where thickening, dewatering and digestion determine both haulage cost and odour complaints. Thermal hydrolysis passes high-temperature steam through the sludge to increase its digestibility, producing a hygienic output from the anaerobic digester and more biogas from improved digestion.
Industrial. Clarifier and chemical sludge from water treatment, oily sludge from API and DAF separators in refineries, mineral sludge from mining and steel, and coloured chemical sludge from textile effluent plants — each needing a different dewatering route.
Thermal hydrolysis also produces high-quality biogas and organic compost from a wide range of organic wastes: residual municipal sludge, animal excreta and agricultural waste.
Capability
Adsorbent systems: what they remove
Where conventional treatment stalls, adsorption often does not. These are the duties our adsorbent systems are built for.
| Duty | Capability |
|---|---|
| COD removal | Up to 90% removal without electricity, reducing COD to 50–70 ppm through a simple flow-through process |
| TSS removal | Effectively eliminates total suspended solids |
| Heavy metals | Removes Zn, Cr, Fe, Cd, Cu, and up to 99.5% of Pb |
| Cyanide & pesticides | Ensures safe disposal of harmful compounds |
| Silica | Addresses silica contamination |
| Ammoniacal nitrogen | Reduces nitrogen-related pollutants |
| Redox chemistry | Neutralises pollutants via advanced oxidation and reduction |
| Colour | Restores clarity by eliminating unwanted colours |
Source: Glorinda water & wastewater technical profile.
Why it is chosen
- Durability — performs under extreme temperature, pH and pressure.
- Regenerable — on-site regeneration allows hundreds of cycles.
- Low CAPEX — minimal upfront investment and no expensive chemicals.
- Plug and play — straightforward installation and operation.
- Resource recovery — recovers valuable contaminants for reuse.
- Minimal waste — produces under 1% waste, against around 30% for an RO system.
- No inlet quality limitation — handles a wide range of feedwater qualities.
Where it sits in the line
Two positions are typical. Ahead of reverse osmosis, where the adsorbent removes the foulants and scalants that would otherwise dictate cleaning frequency and membrane life. Or after an existing wastewater plant, as a polishing stage that brings an out-of-consent discharge back inside its limits without rebuilding the plant.
Because the process is flow-through and needs no electricity for COD removal, it is often the lowest-disruption upgrade available to a site that is already operating.
Applications
By industry
Water problems are industry-specific long before they are technology-specific. These are the streams we are most often asked about, taken from the operating problems plants actually report.
Cooling tower blowdown recovery, cooling water optimisation, boiler feed water treatment, demineralised water production, condensate polishing, FGD wastewater, ash handling wastewater, plant-wide reuse and ZLD for thermal plants.
Produced water treatment, desalter wastewater, refinery cooling water recovery, boiler feed water including HRSG duty, steam cycle chemistry, hydrocarbon-contaminated water from API and CPI separators, high-COD petrochemical effluent, water injection treatment for enhanced oil recovery, and refinery ZLD.
Process water for reaction chemistry, cooling and boiler feed water, high-COD and solvent-contaminated streams, high-TDS neutralisation and salt streams, heavy metal removal, effluent reuse and ZLD.
Boiler feed water for pasteurisation and sterilisation, cooling water optimisation, CIP wastewater with high COD from detergents, fat and protein, process water as a product ingredient, reuse from cooling blowdown and cleaning streams, and dairy effluent with high BOD/COD and heavy sludge production.
Purified water system optimisation, water for injection, ultrapure water for API and laboratory use, pharmaceutical effluent with active compounds and solvents, CIP/SIP wastewater, clean steam feedwater, cooling water, reuse in non-critical duties, ZLD and sludge management.
Process water recycling, tailings water recovery, acid mine drainage, heavy metal removal, flotation wastewater, mine dewatering, steel cooling water, blast furnace gas cleaning effluent, coke plant wastewater with phenol, cyanide and ammonia, pickling line acid effluent and rolling mill oily water.
Dyeing wastewater with colour, salt and high COD, colour removal as a discharge condition in its own right, reuse of dye-house and washing water, high-TDS reactive dyeing effluent, printing wastewater, boiler feed and cooling water, and coloured chemical sludge.
Paper mill effluent with fibre and organics, white water recovery, process water recycling, bleaching wastewater, high-COD pulp mill streams, fibre recovery as a material saving, boiler feed water for the dryer section, and ZLD.
Process water for reactors, granulators and absorption towers, cooling and boiler feed water, ammonia and nitrogen-bearing process condensate, high-TDS scrubber blowdown, reuse across the plant water cycle and ZLD.
Ultrapure water for wafer cleaning, photolithography and rinse systems, semiconductor effluent with acids and heavy metals, chemical mechanical polishing wastewater with ultrafine particles, fab cooling water and UPW recycling.
Irrigation water treatment against clogging and salinity, reuse of treated municipal and industrial effluent for irrigation, agro-processing and livestock wastewater, greenhouse and hydroponic water recycling, and nutrient recovery.
Wastewater treatment plant optimisation, reuse for irrigation, industrial supply and urban applications, sludge treatment and management, membrane bioreactor upgrades where there is no room to expand, desalination for coastal and water-scarce supply, and energy recovery through anaerobic digestion.
Services
Services around the water scope
Engineering
Wastewater characterisation analysis, treatment process selection, plant design for industrial water, industrial wastewater, municipal wastewater and seawater desalination, water reuse system design and water recovery optimisation.
Read moreProcess packages and integration
Complete water and wastewater treatment packages, and integration where several suppliers' equipment has to behave as one process.
Read moreIndustrial services
Installation, commissioning, operation support, operator training, maintenance, troubleshooting and after-sales technical support.
Read moreUpgrading and revamp
Bringing an existing plant back inside consent, increasing its capacity, or cutting its operating cost without a rebuild.
Read moreEvidence
Case studies and projects
Sample layout. Reference projects are being cleared for publication with the clients concerned. The structure below is final; the content is placeholder.
SampleWater reuse retrofit — sample card
Card layout for a completed water reuse project: stream data before and after, recovery achieved, scope Glorinda held, and the client's own words.
SampleZLD package — sample card
Card layout for a zero liquid discharge package: feed characterisation, evaporator type selected, solid output route, and commissioning duration.
SampleOwner's engineer mandate — sample card
Card layout for an advisory mandate: the client's decision, the options assessed, and what changed in the tender as a result.
FAQ
Frequently asked questions
What data do you need before you can propose anything?
Flow rate and its variability, a contaminant analysis (COD, BOD, TDS, TSS, and the specific species that concern you), the discharge consent or reuse quality target, available footprint, and the utilities you have — steam, power, cooling. If you do not have reliable numbers, we will define the sampling campaign that produces them before quoting anything.
Do you supply single stages or only complete plants?
Both. A large share of our work is supplying one stage — pre-treatment, ZLD, post-treatment or sludge — into a plant someone else is building. We ask to see the whole line even when we are only quoting part of it, because a stage designed in isolation is where performance guarantees go wrong.
Can you improve an existing plant rather than replace it?
Usually, and it is normally the better commercial answer. Adsorption as a polishing stage, advanced oxidation for trace organics, membrane retrofits and pre-treatment upgrades all bring plants back inside consent without a rebuild. We assess the existing line first as a matter of course.
Which membranes do you work with?
Ultrafiltration, nanofiltration, ceramic and silicon carbide membranes, in hollow fibre, tubular and flat sheet configurations, plus membrane bioreactors. For silicon carbide we partner with Cembrane, the world's leading producer of SiC membranes for water and wastewater treatment.
How is water reuse justified financially?
Three lines usually move: the cost of fresh intake, the cost and risk of discharge, and — where abstraction is capped — the production the site cannot otherwise add. On sites where the permit limits output, the third line is normally much larger than the first two combined.
Conversion
Take this further
Send us the stream data, the discharge limit or the equipment list you are working from. An engineer reads every enquiry and replies with the questions that actually decide the solution — not a brochure.
Downloads
Contact
Send us the analysis, not the specification
A lab report and a discharge consent tell us more in five minutes than a requirements document does in a week. We will come back with the processes genuinely in play and what each would cost you to run.