In Bayfield, Colo., a small firm is talking to venture capitalists and angel investors looking for $1.3 million in investments to commercialize a chemical compound to clean wastewater systems by May. According to The Durango Herald, the substance is a polymer now named Amagel by GC Solution Inc. The substance was first developed by the Russian space program to remove water from algae.
The CEO of GC Solutions Inc., Chuck Wages, said he has reached a point where it is time to automate production of Amagel, which has been modified from the original Russian substance.
Wages believes Amagel can be used for several applications. The first of which will likely be cleaning produced water in oil and natural gas wells, especially in the Permian Basin in west Texas and eastern New Mexico, where water is at a premium and drillers can clean wastewater streams to recycle water for use in hydraulic fracturing.
He also believes the polymer can be used in an almost limitless array of other uses to clean waste streams, according to The Durango Herald. This includes cleaning wastewater from microbreweries; Wages has a pilot system under development for Santa Fe Brewing Co.
“We’ve been talking to investors, but we haven’t found the right group yet,” Wages said to The Durango Herald. “Right now, the only thing stopping us is a lack of funding.”
According to The Durango Herald, Amagel’s name comes from “gel,” a form the polymer can take before it is formed into a soap-bar-like solid that GC Solutions creates for shipment, and “ama,” the Cherokee word for water. Wages describes Amagel as “a low-cost nanofluid polymer added to water to separate solids, oils, organics, metals, nutrients and bacteria from waste streams.”
It works by binding itself to pollutants and pulling them out of the water. According to The Durango Herald, the substance settles to the bottom, leaving clean water on top and eliminating the need for the use of filters in wastewater systems.
GC Solutions Inc. is currently using Amagel in a wastewater system to clean produced wastewater in oil and natural gas wells in Jal, N.M., and Pecos, Texas. Amagel is also being used in systems to clean industrial wastewater streams in Long Beach and Oxnard, Calif., and in Albuquerque.
