The most expensive water in the world is the water you have to boil out of industrial brine. It is a stubborn, energy-hungry problem that has kept zero liquid discharge, or ZLD, as a premium, last-resort option for factories and mines. Aquafortus, a Houston-based company with roots in New Zealand, is betting it can change the economics with a chemical trick that sidesteps the heat entirely.
Its patented ABX process works like a solvent swap. A specialized absorbent pulls water molecules out of concentrated brine, causing salts to instantly crystallize. A second chemical, the regenerant, then strips the water from the absorbent, producing a clean stream and recycling the absorbent for the next batch. The company claims this liquid-to-liquid crystallization recovers up to 99% of the water while using a fraction of the energy of a thermal evaporator [aquafortus.net]. For industries sitting on billions of barrels of hypersaline wastewater each year, the promise is straightforward: turn a costly disposal liability into a source of reusable water and, potentially, recoverable minerals.
The wedge against thermal evaporation
The core bet is that non-thermal processing can undercut the incumbent on unit economics. Conventional thermal ZLD systems, which evaporate water by applying heat, are effective but notoriously energy-intensive. They dominate the market because, until now, they've been the only reliable way to handle the most concentrated brines where membranes fail. Aquafortus says its solvent-based approach can achieve 60 to 70 percent lower operating costs [Burnt Island Ventures].
The technology is aimed squarely at sectors that generate high-total-dissolved-solids (TDS) waste streams: oil and gas produced water, mining tailings, chemical manufacturing, and flue-gas desulfurization from power plants. In 2024, the company commissioned what it calls the world's first solvent-driven desalination plant, and it operates a 2,000-barrels-per-day pilot facility in West Texas treating oilfield brines [Rice Alliance] [finance.yahoo.com, 2026]. The pilot is the crucial proof point, demonstrating the process can run continuously outside a lab.
A leadership team built for infrastructure scale
While the company was founded in New Zealand in 2015, its current leadership reflects a deliberate shift toward global industrial execution. The founding team, including Jessica Lam and Daryl Briggs, developed the initial IP [Crunchbase]. Today, the C-suite is filled with veterans experienced in deploying large-scale infrastructure.
Hoshang Subawalla, appointed CEO to lead the company's commercial scaling, brings a background in process engineering and business development. The rest of the team covers the bases needed to sell and build multimillion-dollar systems: a CFO (Dave Allworth), a chief commercial officer (Iris Jancik), a CTO (Richard Brunton), and an EVP for the crucial oil and gas vertical (Jim Newman) [aquafortus.net]. This isn't a research project anymore; it's a build-out.
| Role | Name | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Chief Executive Officer | Hoshang Subawalla | Appointed to lead global infrastructure execution |
| Chief Financial Officer | Dave Allworth | Seasoned financial professional |
| Chief Commercial Officer | Iris Jancik | Leads commercial strategy and sales |
| Chief Technology Officer | Richard Brunton | Leads process chemistry team |
| EVP - Oil & Gas | Jim Newman | Focus on key industrial vertical |
| Chief Operating Officer | Matt Kilker | Oversees US operations |
| VP Engineering | Chris Stabler | Engineering leadership |
Funding and the path to commercialization
Building hardware for heavy industry is capital-intensive, and Aquafortus has assembled a war chest from investors who specialize in deep tech and industrial transformation. The total disclosed funding sits around $31 million, anchored by a $17 million Series A1 round in early 2023 [PR Newswire, March 2023]. Its investor list is a mix of climate-tech specialists and strategic partners, including DCVC, Novo Holdings, Burnt Island Ventures, and Halliburton Labs as an accelerator participant.
2021 Series A | 7.5 | M USD
2023 Series A1 | 17 | M USD
Total Disclosed | 31.1 | M USD
The capital is funding the climb from pilot to first commercial deployments. The key milestones to watch in the next 12 to 18 months will be the performance data from the West Texas pilot, the announcement of a first full-scale commercial contract, and likely a subsequent funding round to finance the build-out of those initial projects. The company's ability to convert pilot interest into signed deals at a compelling price point will be the ultimate test.
The competitive and technical landscape
No company gets to redefine a market without a fight. Aquafortus is not alone in chasing the ZLD opportunity. Its most direct competitors include other innovators like Saltworks Technologies, which also offers non-thermal concentration technologies, and companies like Lilac Solutions, which is focused on lithium extraction but tackles similar brine challenges [Competitors]. The broader competitive set includes the established giants of thermal evaporation, who own the existing customer relationships and have decades of operational data.
The risks for Aquafortus are classic for a deep-tech hardware company moving from pilot to product.
- Chemical economics. The long-term cost and availability of its proprietary absorbent and regenerant chemicals are critical. The process hinges on their efficient, near-total recovery and reuse over thousands of cycles.
- Scaling surprises. A 2,000-barrel-per-day pilot is significant, but scaling to 20,000 or 200,000 barrels per day can introduce unforeseen engineering, maintenance, or efficiency challenges.
- Sales motion. Selling a capital-intensive, novel system into conservative industrial sectors requires a proven enterprise sales track record. The new commercial team must prove it can navigate long procurement cycles and convince plant managers to switch from a known, if expensive, technology.
The company's answer to these risks is its pilot data and its assembled team. The West Texas facility is the live demo, intended to de-risk the technology for first customers. The experienced leadership is their bet on being able to speak the language of plant operators and deliver on complex projects.
The water and energy math
Let's run the numbers the way a plant manager would. If a conventional thermal ZLD system spends 70 cents of every operating dollar on energy, a 70% reduction from Aquafortus turns that into 21 cents [Burnt Island Ventures]. For a facility processing 10,000 barrels of brine per day, that operational savings could run into millions of dollars annually, potentially paying back the capital cost of the new system in a few years instead of a decade. That's the switch they need to flip.
For Aquafortus to become a default choice, it must do more than just beat thermal evaporation on paper. It must reliably and repeatedly beat it in the field, in the Permian Basin and at mining sites, under the watch of engineers who have seen promising technologies fail before. The company has convinced specialist investors and built a serious team. Now it has to convince the first customer to turn off the boiler.
Sources
- [aquafortus.net] Aquafortus - The future of wastewater treatment | https://aquafortus.net
- [Burnt Island Ventures] Why We Invested in Aquafortus | https://www.burntislandventures.com/blog/why-we-invested-in-aquafortus
- [Rice Alliance] Aquafortus | https://alliance.rice.edu/person/aquafortus
- [finance.yahoo.com, 2026] | https://finance.yahoo.com
- [Crunchbase] Aquafortus - Crunchbase Company Profile & Funding | https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/aquafortus
- [PR Newswire, March 2023] Water technology company Aquafortus raises $17M in Series A1 | https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/water-technology-company-aquafortus-raises-17m-in-series-a1-purifies-high-salinity-brines-while-extracting-precious-resources-affordably-301754298.html
- [Competitors] Saltworks Technologies, Lilac Solutions
- [Startup Intros] Aquafortus: Funding, Team & Investors | https://startupintros.com/orgs/aquafortus
- [PitchBook] | https://pitchbook.com