Overview
ARBOK-PHARMIX separates pharmaceutical compounds out of wastewater under deep vacuum at ambient temperature. Wastewater boils at room temperature under vacuum; lighter molecules pass to vapour while heavier, less volatile compounds — APIs, hormones, antibiotics — concentrate in the liquid phase and settle as a layered concentrate. Separation happens without catalysts, without membranes, without chemical reagents and without any consumables. Energy consumption is 0.7 kWh/m³ against 150–250 kWh/tonne for evaporative ZLD — 70 to 125 times less. Over 99.9 % of the input water is recovered clean and returns directly to the process, and the captured compounds leave as dry salts, metals or acids of varying purity, all of which have market value.
The logic is inverted relative to every conventional approach. Biological, membrane, carbon and evaporative methods all dilute hazardous compounds in water and then attempt to extract them at any cost. PHARMIX prevents them from entering the treated water at all.
Applications
API and pharmaceutical manufacturing plants, particularly in India and China where 80–90 % of the world's antibiotics are produced. European and American pharmaceutical sites — Roche, Novartis, Pfizer scale — with flows of 1,000–5,000 m³/day. Municipal treatment plants carrying pharmaceutical micropollutant load. Compliance with the EU Urban Wastewater Treatment Directive effective January 2025, which places extended responsibility for micropollutant removal on pharmaceutical manufacturers.
Operating Principle
The process runs under deep vacuum at ambient temperature. Under vacuum the wastewater boils at ordinary room temperature and evaporates: lighter molecules pass into vapour, while heavier and less volatile molecules — including APIs, hormones and antibiotics — concentrate in the liquid phase and settle to the bottom of the unit as a layered concentrate.
The concentrate is then separated into its constituents within the same unit and discharged dry, as salts or metals, or as acids of varying purity and concentration.
The vapour is purified to a particle threshold below 30 nanometres — a range unreachable by reverse osmosis, ZLD or activated carbon. Recovered water exceeds 99.9 % of the input volume and returns directly to the production cycle without further treatment, which removes water purchase from the plant's cost structure entirely.
No catalysts, no membranes, no chemical reagents, no consumables. The only input is electricity.
Key Parameters
| Parameter | Value |
|—|—|
| Operating temperature | ambient — no heat supplied, no setpoint |
| Energy consumption | 0.7 kWh/m³ |
| Comparison: evaporative ZLD (MEE) | 150–250 kWh/tonne — 70–125× higher |
| Water recovery | >99.9 % of input volume |
| Vapour purity | particles below 30 nm |
| Consumables | none |
| Membranes, catalysts, reagents | none |
| Liquid waste | none |
| Outputs | clean water, dry salts, metals, acids |
Architecture and Components
Deep-vacuum chamber operating at ambient temperature; vapour condensation and clean-water return line to the production cycle; layered concentrate collection at the base of the unit; in-unit separation of the concentrate into salts, metals and acid fractions; dry and liquid product discharge. No membrane modules, no reagent dosing, no carbon beds, no evaporator train.
Advantages
Technical: captures all heavy and dissolved particles; vapour purified below 30 nm, beyond the reach of RO, ZLD or activated carbon; no biological stage to poison — conventional plants kill their own aerobic bacteria with API load and then expect them to digest organic waste; no chlorination, which converts APIs into more toxic compounds than the originals; no polyamide membranes to be destroyed by solvents and surfactants inevitably present in pharmaceutical effluent.
Economic: cost reduction of 96–98 % against current practice. Recovered acids, salts and metals convert a disposal cost into revenue. Water purchase is eliminated because the water returns to the cycle.
Strategic: the 96–98 % cost reduction allows aggressive pricing — an 8–12 % discount can lift sales volume 20–35 % without sacrificing margin.
Environmental: pollution is prevented at source rather than reduced to permitted levels at the cost of chemicals, membranes and equipment. No one waste stream is converted into several others, each requiring its own disposal.
Integrations
ARBOK MedZWD · ARBOK-VC (Vacuum Cracking) · AZOW-Domus · ARBOK-EFFLUENT · ARBOK PURI
Installs on site at the manufacturing plant, replacing the biological, chemical and membrane cascade rather than supplementing it.
Deployment & Operation
On-site installation at the pharmaceutical plant. Operation requires electricity only — no reagent supply chain, no membrane replacement schedule, no carbon regeneration cycle, no concentrate disposal contract.
Detailed commissioning sequence and staffing: [требует уточнения из базы]
TRL
TRL 9. Working technology, not a laboratory concept.
Market Potential
The scale of the problem. Of roughly 31,000 tonnes of the forty most widely used antibiotics consumed annually, about 9,500 tonnes — one third — reach the world river system. 631 pharmaceutical compounds have been recorded in the environment of 71 countries, while medical practice uses around 4,000 active substances, most of which have never been tested for presence in water bodies.
Antimicrobial resistance. Near Indian pharmaceutical plants, ciprofloxacin — a broad-spectrum fluoroquinolone critical for pneumonia, severe urinary tract infection and sepsis — is recorded in plant effluent at 28–31 mg/L. Over 100 kilograms of this single antibiotic leaves one industrial cluster daily. Bacteria that develop resistance to it simultaneously lose sensitivity to most first-line antibiotics. WHO data attributes over one million deaths per year to antibiotic-resistant infections. Chinese researchers found that treatment plants near pharmaceutical facilities release on average 4–5 times more antibiotic-resistant bacteria than they receive — the plant amplifies the threat rather than removing it.
Endocrine effects. Synthetic hormones alter the reproductive systems of aquatic fauna at concentrations as low as 1 nanogram per litre. In some British rivers the proportion of intersex fish exceeded 80 %.
Market size. Combined direct and indirect global pharmaceutical wastewater management spending is estimated at $5–7 billion per year. The EU Urban Wastewater Treatment Directive, in force since January 2025, adds an estimated €1.2 billion per year to industry burden for micropollutant removal alone.
Typical Project Economics
Reference: Indian API plant, 500 m³/day (100–300 tonnes of API per year in effluent)
| Item | Current practice | With PHARMIX |
|—|—|—|
| Annual treatment cost | $5.5–9 M (ZLD at $30–50/m³) | — |
| Electricity (at $0.08/kWh) | — | ~$10,200/year |
| Water purchase | ~$150,000/year | eliminated (returned to cycle) |
| Chemical reagents | ~$600,000/year | eliminated |
| Revenue from acids, salts, metals | — | +$150,000–300,000/year |
| Full OPEX including amortization | $5.5–9 M | $120,000–200,000 |
| Reduction | — | 30–45×, or 96–98 % |
Reference: European plant, 2,000 m³/day
| Item | Current practice | With PHARMIX |
|—|—|—|
| Annual water treatment cost | €15–30 M (at $20–40/m³) | — |
| Electricity (at €0.30/kWh) | — | ~€153,000/year |
| Full OPEX | €15–30 M | $800,000–1,200,000 |
| Payback | — | ~5 years |
Why ZLD costs what it does: evaporation requires 150–250 kWh per tonne of water, which at European electricity around €0.40/kWh is €60–100 of pure energy cost per cubic metre before amortization, chemical preparation, servicing or concentrate disposal. CAPEX runs $1.5–3.5 million, and the process then consumes a further $250–600 per cubic metre of dried concentrate. It does not solve the environmental problem — it moves it from liquid phase to solid.
Risk Factors
Adoption depends on manufacturers computing the true cost of their current treatment, which the source material argues few do — costs are distributed across departments and no participant sees the whole picture. Plants in weakly regulated jurisdictions have limited incentive to disclose actual discharge parameters, since accurate reporting risks closure. Detailed commissioning requirements, staffing and site-specific concentrate composition handling are not documented in the base.
Related Technologies
ARBOK MedZWD · ARBOK-VC (Vacuum Cracking) · AZOW-Domus · ARBOK-EFFLUENT · ARBOK-REVITA