By the end of 2020, water is expected to be a 100 trillion yen industry, with global demand expanding unfettered due to economic development and population growth in developing countries. Businesses in this sector include sewage purification, seawater desalination and water utility operations, and Japan is at the innovative forefront.
About a 15-minute drive from central Muscat in the eastern part of the Arabian Peninsula, a huge plant sits in the middle of the desert surrounded by rocks and sand. It is one of the largest water treatment facilities in the Middle East, and it is operated by the municipal authorities of Muscat.
Kubota Corp., a giant in the Japanese agricultural machinery business, has supplied the facility with filtration equipment that uses a membrane bioreactor (MBR) system.
Kubota was the first company in Japan to succeed in mass-producing water pipes and has a long history in the water industry. The company was also the first in the world to use MBRs in a practical application, in which special membranes and microorganisms are used to remove bacteria and sludge from sewage.
MBRs do not require a sedimentation tank, making the facilities more compact and reducing the amount of cleaning and other maintenance work.
Since 1993, more than 6,000 water treatment facilities in Japan and abroad have used Kubota's MBR system.
Water treatment facilities are an important part of the infrastructure in the desert nation of Oman, and while competing with large companies, such as the French firm Suez SA, Kubota was selected for its low cost and its ability to treat water.
The Nakahama Sewage Treatment Plant in Osaka has also adopted the MBR system. The plant is located upstream of the Dotonbori River, which runs through the city's Minami district. The order is worth about 10 billion yen, and the plant will begin operating in 2021. The increased capacity of the plant is expected to improve the river's water quality to flow clear water.
"Japanese companies have advanced technology and expertise [in the water industry], and the demand is spreading in Japan and abroad," Kazuhiro Shinabe, Kubota's Managing Executive Officer, said. "We want to develop this business as a pillar of our operations."
-- From seawater to freshwater
Desalination, the process of removing salt from seawater to produce fresh water, is essential to daily life in the Middle East. The region has little rainfall, so desalination plants are critical for supplying potable water.
The core of this technology is the reverse osmosis membrane, which removes salt and other impurities by applying 60 to 70 times the atmospheric pressure to seawater. The development and production of this kind of technology is the specialty of textile and material manufacturers such as Toyobo Co., Toray Industries Inc. and Nitto Denko Corp., all of which originated in the Kansai region.
In Saudi Arabia, which has the largest market, Toyobo claims a 50% share. The amount of fresh water that is produced using Toyobo's membranes is about 1.6 million tons per day, supplying 6.4 million residents.
However, RO membranes are becoming more common, creating competition in the marketplace, so every company is facing the challenge of trying to differentiate its products from other firms.
Nitto Denko, for example, is entering the field of zero liquid discharge (ZLD), which is the process of extracting potable water from wastewater and liquid waste. The system has attracted increased global attention in recent years.
The company has developed an original membrane that can withstand high pressure to remove toxic substances and chemicals from the water. These membranes will be supplied to India and China, where regulations for industrial wastewater are being tightened.
With economic development and population growth in developing countries, demand for water is increasing worldwide, not only for drinking water but also for industrial and agricultural water. Some estimates suggest that the size of the global water market will exceed 100 trillion yen by the end of 2020, up from 82 trillion yen in 2013.
In the United States and Europe, most of the demand is for replacing aging infrastructure. In developing countries such as Cambodia, Myanmar and Laos, the most pressing issue is developing basic infrastructures such as water and sewage systems and sewage treatment facilities. In the Middle East and Africa, where there is little rainfall, there is a great need for desalination technology using water treatment membranes.
-- Only 0.01% available
About 70% of the Earth's surface is covered with water, however, 97.5% of that is seawater. Only 2.5% of the Earth is covered with fresh water, but most of that is in glaciers and icebergs, leaving only 0.01% of all the water on the planet available to drink.
The global population, which was 2.5 billion in 1950, is expected to increase to 9.7 billion by 2050. As emerging economies develop, demand for industrial and agricultural water, as well as potable water, is expected to significantly increase. Water resources are unevenly distributed by region, and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals call for securing safe water, emphasizing the increasing importance of the water industry.
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