Water use for industrial purposes represents a significant portion of the world's total water use. Despite being a high consumer of water, many industrial end users often need more efficient water management.
Water and wastewater assets are usually non-revenue generating and not core to the primary product being manufactured at the facility. Most plant capital investment is typically prioritized/allocated to revenue-generating activities, not for unaddressed water and wastewater asset upgrades or enhancements. Because of this, many sites deal with aging water treatment assets, which typically operate with high costs and low reliability.
In addition, at most sites, the operations and maintenance resources are shared with limited staff solely dedicated to water treatment. Those staff members often need to be more highly specialized and skilled in water treatment. This, paired with aging water professionals and a shortage of skilled workers, leads to inefficient operations.
These challenges can be overcome and addressed quickly by leveraging outsourcing solutions. By using water technology as a service, operations outsourcing allows you to bring expertise and new technologies into your operations, facilitating you to focus on your core business operations. As a result, you have peace of mind knowing your plant is taken care of by experts with increased reliability and efficient performance.
Reduce Costs
Inefficient operations caused by aging assets or inexperienced treatment professionals can drive up your plant’s operational costs through high chemical and energy usage, higher spare parts costs or low water recycling. Also, hiring experienced water treatment professionals can be costly if you hire internally instead of outsourcing your staffing through a partner.
In addition, many manufacturing facilities face capital constraints on non-revenue generating operations. Outsourcing operations can shift your expenditure from Capex to Opex by transferring your assets to a third party, significantly reducing your upfront expenditure. Aquatech’s AQUIOS platform provides a spectrum of outsourcing solutions, from water and energy purchase agreements to the leasing and renting mobile and decentralized treatment plants. AQUIOS can also acquire and retrofit existing facilities to improve operating performance.
Reduce Risk
Many facilities run their water treatment operations with personnel who need to be experienced or specialized in water treatment. This exposes the site to risks associated with improper asset management, health and safety concerns, and inefficient operations. Outsourcing to an accountable partner fills a skills gap that could otherwise make a facility vulnerable to potential upsets. This helps prevent problems before they occur, and if something goes wrong, it’s on your outsourcing partner to fix it.
The third party becomes responsible for meeting quality specifications and supplying water within an outsourced service contract. There are typically guarantees surrounding water quality and quantity on-site with an outsourced partner, allowing you to focus on your core operations, not water production.
Meet Sustainability Targets
Many facilities need help to meet sustainability targets due to inefficient operations stemming from high water and energy use, lower water recycling, or increased chemical use. This can be avoided by bringing on an outsourcing partner to help bridge the gap between intention and action to achieve sustainability goals.
An outsourcing partner with experience balancing mission-critical water challenges and paramount sustainability goals has access to the latest water treatment technologies, data analytics, and people to ensure your plant operates with efficient technology and improved monitoring, leading to smarter troubleshooting and decision-making.
Increase Reliability
The needs of a treatment plant are constantly evolving, so flexibility is critical to address changing operating conditions. Having the on-site expertise of an outsourcing partner ensures a site has the know-how and technologies to meet these changing demands.
When selecting an outsourcing model, you must be flexible in choosing how hands-on or off you want to be and for how long. This means deciding between operating your equipment and consulting an outsourcing partner when needed or having the partner run the operations.
The demand for outsourcing water treatment will continue to rise as a viable option for industrial end users. Whether you need help designing and building a complete water treatment system or operating and maintaining operations, outsourcing treatment may fit your needs.
At Aquatech, we offer water technology as a service by integrating technology, expertise, and financing to consistently deliver reliable performance at a predictable cost for customers. With our 40 years of experience helping some of the world’s largest end-users with their water and wastewater treatment needs, our highly qualified and trained field team is ready to help you reach your operational and sustainability goals.
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