Cleaner water through innovation

Environmental technology firm wants to be the Ben & Jerry’s of its field
Tim Burns and John Haley view themselves as the Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield of the wastewater business.

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Just like Ben & Jerry’s Homemade, their company, BioProcess Technologies, is making a widely used product in an innovative way. Cohen and Greenfield added novel ingredients such as brownies to their ice cream; Burns and Haley have reinvented the water cleanup process.

The two companies both have strong ties to the states in which they are based. Just as Ben & Jerry’s makes a point of using dairy products and labor from its home state of Vermont, Burns and Haley choose to use local vendors for BioProcess.

Burns, the company’s president and CEO, said he and Haley “have a common view of world.” Burns, a former head of Save the Bay’s board of directors, met Haley through a mutual friend in the late 1990s. Both wanted to do something good for the state and for the environment.

“We both thought, ‘Why don’t we build some products and build a company?’ ” Burns recalled.

The patented technology within the company’s “biofilm towers” was developed by Haley, whose official title is chief science officer.

In conventional treatment systems, the wastewater goes into basins with a sludge of pollutant-digesting microbes, and oxygen is pumped in to activate the process. Large amounts of water and energy are required. The sludge comes out with the cleaned water and is discarded.

The BioProcess system, on the other hand, uses looped cords of a special fiber, covered with synthetic filaments that are, in turn, coated with microbes. The cords are packed together and hung in the biofilm towers. Wastewater is then sprayed in from the top, and as it trickles through the towers to a holding tank below, it is cleaned of contaminants such as ammonia and nitrogen.

The system mirrors the natural, biological metabolism that occurs when the bacteria attached to root filaments in lagoons, swamps and wetlands remove pollutants from the surrounding water, the company’s Web site explains.

The microbes stay on the cords as the water goes through, so there’s no need to replace the sludge all the time. Only a small oxygen pump is needed, Haley said, so the technology can save up to 90 percent of the energy costs of a traditional system.

The company has installed 42 such towers to date, Burns said, for customers in three main fields: agriculture, food and beverage, and municipalities. The annual market for wastewater treatment in the U.S. food and beverage industry alone is $500 million, Burns said, and “many billions” will be spent on systems for farms and municipalities over the next 20 to 30 years.

Corporate giants such as General Electric Co. and Siemens see the opportunities, as well. In June, GE completed the $689 million acquisition of Zenon Environmental, a Canadian maker of membranes for wastewater treatment and other uses. Siemens acquired a similar company, USFilter Corp., two years ago.

But Burns said BioProcess plans to bid on some of the same projects as its much larger competitors. He believes the company’s technology can be installed faster and more cheaply, while delivering better results.

For clients struggling to comply with environmental regulations, that can make a big difference. That was the case for ATP Manufacturing, a North Smithfield company that, lacking access to public sewers, had nowhere to pump the ammonia-rich water it used in making shoe insoles.

If it hadn’t been for BioProcess, “I think that the company might have looked [to do business] in another state,” said Paul Parenteau, a spokesman for ATP.

Besides trying to solve local clients’ problems, Burns and Haley also make a point of getting their services and materials from local companies.

TPI Marine Services, in Portsmouth, produces the fiberglass walls for the company’s biotowers – work that enables the boat builder to stay busy during its slow season, from mid-fall to late-winter, Burns said. Concordia Manufacturing, in Coventry, supplies the synthetic fibers for the towers’ looped cords.

“You can cheapen the product and make it offshore,” Haley said. “But we’ve made the conscious decision to make it here … in hopes of producing a better product.”