Claros Technologies, an advanced materials company, has recently announced a strategic collaboration with Kureha America Inc., a chemical manufacturing company. The partnership was inked to develop a technology capable of capturing, concentrating, and destroying PFAS (per-and polyfluoroalkyl substances) from wastewater.
This technology could trap and concentrate PFAS chemicals, then break their carbon-fluorine bonds permanently into non-toxic, naturally occurring elements.
Kureha and Claros will jointly roll out a commercially feasible system and deploy the systems in the Asian markets.
Commenting on the move, Michelle Bellanca, CEO of Claros Technologies, commended Kureha for its leading role in demonstrating how manufacturers can be good environmental and social stewards.
Bellanca also noted that Claros and Kureha have realized that the environment and the children are primary backers of this partnership. Working on the same vision, both firms look forward to closing the loop on PFAS (per-and polyfluoroalkyl substances) pollution.
For the unversed, PFAS are a set of highly durable, water and oil-resisting compounds used in several industries and consumer products.
PFAS, which are present in the drinking water of an estimated 200 million Americans, pose a severe threat to both public and environmental health due to their links to malignancies, immunosuppression, and reproductive problems.
This risk gets intensified with the inability of natural processes to break PFAS down, given the presence of extremely strong carbon-fluorine (C-F) bonds, which are known as forever chemicals.
It is worth noting that at present, PFAS wastes like spent filter materials are incinerated or disposed of in landfills.
However, these disposal methods cannot break the carbon-fluorine bonds constantly, thus resulting in reemissions of PFAS into water, land, and air.
In response, several nations of the United States, along with countries like Japan, are pursuing measures to ban incineration and landfill disposal of PFAS waste.
Source credit - https://www.waterworld.com/wastewater/treatment/press-release/14281054/claros-technologies-kureha-partner-to-develop-pfas-treatment-system