Crystallization
Long-duration, grid-scale storage is the bottleneck of the renewable-and-AI energy transition, and the vanadium redox flow battery (VRFB) is the leading candidate for 8–12 hour storage, with a market growing about 20 %/yr.
Technology brief
Long-duration, grid-scale storage is the bottleneck of the renewable-and-AI energy transition, and the vanadium redox flow battery (VRFB) is the leading candidate for 8–12 hour storage, with a market growing about 20 %/yr.
The challenge
Primary use cases: treatment of Western U.S. alkaline groundwater intakes carrying vanadate together with arsenic, hexavalent chromium and uranium — the San Joaquin Valley and the Mojave region are the named cases; municipal drinking-water production where multiple contaminant-specific treatment trains are otherwise required.
Outputs/uses: clean water (drinking or technical) as the primary product; vanadium concentrate as feedstock for downstream V₂O₅ / ferrovanadium / electrolyte production for VRFB; uranium concentrate as nuclear-fuel feedstock; chromium compounds as a product (Cr(VI) reduced to Cr(III) and precipitated); gypsum; sodium chloride (table salt); arsenic fixed in a stabilized form.
Industries and users: water utilities, grid-storage and battery-electrolyte supply chains, high-strength steel (>90 % of vanadium consumption today), nuclear fuel supply, critical-minerals programs.
Scale: container-scale modular units; the worked case is an average intake stream of 1,000 m³/h (~10 Mm³/yr).
ARBOK solution
Long-duration, grid-scale storage is the bottleneck of the renewable-and-AI energy transition, and the vanadium redox flow battery (VRFB) is the leading candidate for 8–12 hour storage, with a market growing about 20 %/yr. Vanadium supply is concentrated — China accounts for more than 50 % of production and dominates refining — the United States is import-reliant for both ferrovanadium and pentoxide, and vanadium is a designated critical mineral. The paradox: vanadium already occurs, dissolved as the mobile vanadate oxyanion, in the oxic alkaline groundwaters of the western United States, co-located with arsenic, hexavalent chromium and uranium — regulated contaminants that utilities are already obligated to remove at cost, and then bury. The West thus pays twice: the direct cost of treatment, and the loss of two strategic metals it subsequently imports. ARBOK-ZWD separates the salts out of the groundwater in one deep-vacuum step and delivers clean water plus separated commercial fractions, including a vanadium concentrate and a uranium concentrate, while reducing the toxicants to a small stabilized volume.
> Core technology and architecture: see ARBOK-VC (Vacuum Cracking). This entry covers the vanadium-specific feedstock, market, and economics.
Conventional treatment applies a separate process train to each contaminant — expensive and economically unattractive. ARBOK-ZWD instead works with the whole groundwater stream and without high pressure: in a single deep-vacuum step at near-ambient temperature it separates the water from the dissolved salts, and the salts leave separated by fraction. Output: clean water plus a vanadium concentrate, a uranium concentrate, chromium compounds, gypsum and sodium chloride. Hexavalent chromium is reduced to trivalent and precipitated — converted into a marketable, lower-toxicity form rather than merely relocated; arsenic is fixed in a stabilized form. The architecture therefore reduces rather than relocates the toxic liability. Energy performance is achieved through deep vacuum with heat recuperation up to 98 %; the units operate in vacuum, so there is no oxidative corrosion.
Boundary stated explicitly in all three source versions — what ARBOK does NOT promise: it does not smelt metal. Its function is dewatering and salt separation, handing a concentrate to existing refiners. Bringing vanadium to V₂O₅, ferrovanadium or electrolyte is a standard separate industry, incomparably easier from a concentrate than from dilute water.
Further limitations from the sources: the principal product is water, not metal — the direct vanadium revenue is symbolic; the uranium contribution depends on the specific intake and is present only where the aquifer carries it; all figures are intake-specific and require site assay.
Market and application
Demand: VRFB is the leading long-duration (8–12 hour) storage option, with a market growing about 20 %/yr (source reference cites ~US$0.5B in 2025 rising to ~US$3B by 2035). Because vanadium is locked in the recirculating electrolyte rather than consumed, each gigawatt-hour of installed storage corresponds to tons of bound metal, and demand scales with installed capacity rather than annual turnover. More than 90 % of vanadium is consumed in high-strength steel — a stable commodity base — with VRFB as the growth vector.
Supply: China more than 50 % of production and dominant in refining; the United States fully import-reliant on ferrovanadium and pentoxide; vanadium designated a critical mineral. A domestic non-Chinese source, even modest in tonnage, carries strategic value disproportionate to its commodity price.
Adjacent market: multi-contaminant groundwater treatment across Western U.S. intakes, where removal by separate trains runs ~$0.5–1.5/m³, on the order of $5–15 M/yr for a large intake.
The product here is water, not metal. For an average stream of 1,000 m³/h (~10 Mm³/yr) at 21 µg/L V:
| Line | Figure |
|---|---|
| Recoverable vanadium | ~190 kg/yr |
| Vanadium price basis | ~$11/kg V₂O₅ — direct metal value is symbolic, treated as strategy rather than revenue |
| Uranium | Adds nuclear-fuel feedstock depending on the intake |
| Conventional multi-contaminant removal cost avoided | ~$0.5–1.5/m³ ≈ $5–15 M/yr for a large intake |
| OPEX coverage | Recovered sodium chloride covers the OPEX of the whole process |
| Hazardous-fraction disposal cost | Largely eliminated — toxicants exit in a small, separated, stabilized form, chromium as a product |
Net benefit is on the order of the avoided treatment cost — $5–15 M/yr per intake — plus clean water and the strategic metals (vanadium, uranium) on top. Capital cost is project-specific; delivery by purchase or BOOM. CAPEX figure: .
Use cases
Primary use cases: treatment of Western U.S. alkaline groundwater intakes carrying vanadate together with arsenic, hexavalent chromium and uranium — the San Joaquin Valley and the Mojave region are the named cases; municipal drinking-water production where multiple contaminant-specific treatment trains are otherwise required.
Outputs/uses: clean water (drinking or technical) as the primary product; vanadium concentrate as feedstock for downstream V₂O₅ / ferrovanadium / electrolyte production for VRFB; uranium concentrate as nuclear-fuel feedstock; chromium compounds as a product (Cr(VI) reduced to Cr(III) and precipitated); gypsum; sodium chloride (table salt); arsenic fixed in a stabilized form.
Industries and users: water utilities, grid-storage and battery-electrolyte supply chains, high-strength steel (>90 % of vanadium consumption today), nuclear fuel supply, critical-minerals programs.
Scale: container-scale modular units; the worked case is an average intake stream of 1,000 m³/h (~10 Mm³/yr).
Deployment is on an existing groundwater intake that the utility is already obligated to treat, replacing the stack of contaminant-specific trains with a single pass. Container-scale modular units, 15–20 year service life. Delivery is offered by purchase or under a Build-Own-Operate-Maintain (BOOM) model. Capital cost is project-specific and figures are intake-specific, requiring site assay before a project model is fixed. Commissioning schedule and staffing: [требует уточнения из базы].
One process closes several tasks at once — grid storage (vanadium), energy security (uranium), drinking-water compliance (arsenic, chromium) and water-utility economics. The salt fraction connects to salt finishing covered by ARBOK-CRYSTALLIZER. Shares the whole-stream vacuum-separation route applied to metal-bearing waters with ARBOK-Indium and ARBOK-Scandium-REE, and to mine and process waters with ARBOK-Copper-Waters. Platform: ARBOK-VC (Vacuum Cracking).
Long-duration, grid-scale storage is the bottleneck of the renewable-and-AI energy transition, and the vanadium redox flow battery (VRFB) is the leading candidate for 8–12 hour storage, with a market growing about 20 %/yr. Vanadium supply is concentrated — China accounts for more than 50 % of production and dominates refining — the United States is import-reliant for both ferrovanadium and pentoxide, and vanadium is a designated critical mineral. The paradox: vanadium already occurs, dissolved as the mobile vanadate oxyanion, in the oxic alkaline groundwaters of the western United States, co-located with arsenic, hexavalent chromium and uranium — regulated contaminants that utilities are already obligated to remove at cost, and then bury. The West thus pays twice: the direct cost of treatment, and the loss of two strategic metals it subsequently imports. ARBOK-ZWD separates the salts out of the groundwater in one deep-vacuum step and delivers clean water plus separated commercial fractions, including a vanadium concentrate and a uranium concentrate, while reducing the toxicants to a small stabilized volume.
> Core technology and architecture: see ARBOK-VC (Vacuum Cracking). This entry covers the vanadium-specific feedstock, market, and economics.
Primary use cases: treatment of Western U.S. alkaline groundwater intakes carrying vanadate together with arsenic, hexavalent chromium and uranium — the San Joaquin Valley and the Mojave region are the named cases; municipal drinking-water production where multiple contaminant-specific treatment trains are otherwise required.
Outputs/uses: clean water (drinking or technical) as the primary product; vanadium concentrate as feedstock for downstream V₂O₅ / ferrovanadium / electrolyte production for VRFB; uranium concentrate as nuclear-fuel feedstock; chromium compounds as a product (Cr(VI) reduced to Cr(III) and precipitated); gypsum; sodium chloride (table salt); arsenic fixed in a stabilized form.
Industries and users: water utilities, grid-storage and battery-electrolyte supply chains, high-strength steel (>90 % of vanadium consumption today), nuclear fuel supply, critical-minerals programs.
Scale: container-scale modular units; the worked case is an average intake stream of 1,000 m³/h (~10 Mm³/yr).
Conventional treatment applies a separate process train to each contaminant — expensive and economically unattractive. ARBOK-ZWD instead works with the whole groundwater stream and without high pressure: in a single deep-vacuum step at near-ambient temperature it separates the water from the dissolved salts, and the salts leave separated by fraction. Output: clean water plus a vanadium concentrate, a uranium concentrate, chromium compounds, gypsum and sodium chloride. Hexavalent chromium is reduced to trivalent and precipitated — converted into a marketable, lower-toxicity form rather than merely relocated; arsenic is fixed in a stabilized form. The architecture therefore reduces rather than relocates the toxic liability. Energy performance is achieved through deep vacuum with heat recuperation up to 98 %; the units operate in vacuum, so there is no oxidative corrosion.
Boundary stated explicitly in all three source versions — what ARBOK does NOT promise: it does not smelt metal. Its function is dewatering and salt separation, handing a concentrate to existing refiners. Bringing vanadium to V₂O₅, ferrovanadium or electrolyte is a standard separate industry, incomparably easier from a concentrate than from dilute water.
Further limitations from the sources: the principal product is water, not metal — the direct vanadium revenue is symbolic; the uranium contribution depends on the specific intake and is present only where the aquifer carries it; all figures are intake-specific and require site assay.
| Parameter | Value |
|---|---|
| Process | Single deep-vacuum step, near-ambient temperature, no high pressure |
| Water recovery | Up to 99.98 % of the water returned in clean form |
| Extraction of dissolved species | 90–95 % |
| Energy consumption | 0.72 kWh/m³ headline; independently certified at 0.723 kWh/m³ (SGS Certificate No. 2305080850, 2023) and 0.845 kWh/m³ (SGS Inspection Report No. 210272, 2021), both metered and photo-documented |
| Heat recuperation | Up to 98 % |
| Product-water quality | Within drinking-water limits per SGS-witnessed 2023 laboratory analysis (boron 0.03 mg/L against a 1.0 limit) |
| Equipment | Container-type modular units, process in vacuum — units do not rust |
| Service life | 15–20 years |
| Feed — vanadium (San Joaquin Valley) | Median 21 µg/L, up to 70 µg/L; ~7 % of wells above the California notification level of 50 µg/L |
| Feed — co-occurring contaminants | Arsenic (EPA MCL 10 µg/L), hexavalent chromium (California MCL 10 µg/L), uranium (EPA MCL 30 µg/L); all four co-occur in the Mojave region |
| Feed — uranium level | Tens of µg/L where present; contribution depends on the specific intake |
| Output fractions | Vanadium concentrate, uranium concentrate, chromium compounds, gypsum, sodium chloride, arsenic in stabilized form |
| Worked stream size | 1,000 m³/h ≈ 10 Mm³/yr |
Container-scale modular ZWD units operating in vacuum, with a single deep-vacuum separation stage at near-ambient temperature and heat recuperation up to 98 %. The stage dewaters the whole groundwater stream and resolves the dissolved load into separate fractions along the train: vanadium concentrate, uranium concentrate, chromium compounds (with a Cr(VI) → Cr(III) reduction and precipitation step), gypsum, sodium chloride, and a stabilized arsenic fraction. No high-pressure section and no per-contaminant treatment trains. Downstream refining to V₂O₅, ferrovanadium or electrolyte is outside the ARBOK scope and is handed to existing refiners. Base train detail: see the platform entry.
Technical: one pass replaces several contaminant-specific treatment trains; salts leave separated by fraction rather than as a mixed sludge; Cr(VI) is converted to a stabilized Cr(III) product instead of being concentrated as a soluble hazard; no high pressure; vacuum operation removes oxidative corrosion.
Verified performance: energy certified twice by independent SGS inspection (0.723 kWh/m³ in 2023, 0.845 kWh/m³ in 2021), metered and photo-documented, and product water certified within drinking limits by SGS-witnessed analysis — the claims rest on inspection reports, not calculation.
Economic: recovered sodium chloride covers the OPEX of the whole process, while the heavy-metal salts and the water are byproducts; the cost of disposing of hazardous fractions is largely eliminated.
Environmental and public health: removal of arsenic, hexavalent chromium and uranium to drinking-water compliance, toxicants reduced to a small managed volume, and clean water returned in water-stressed western basins.
Strategic: a domestic, non-Chinese source of battery metal, plus uranium where present — strategic value disproportionate to the commodity price of the tonnage involved.
One process closes several tasks at once — grid storage (vanadium), energy security (uranium), drinking-water compliance (arsenic, chromium) and water-utility economics. The salt fraction connects to salt finishing covered by ARBOK-CRYSTALLIZER. Shares the whole-stream vacuum-separation route applied to metal-bearing waters with ARBOK-Indium and ARBOK-Scandium-REE, and to mine and process waters with ARBOK-Copper-Waters. Platform: ARBOK-VC (Vacuum Cracking).
Deployment is on an existing groundwater intake that the utility is already obligated to treat, replacing the stack of contaminant-specific trains with a single pass. Container-scale modular units, 15–20 year service life. Delivery is offered by purchase or under a Build-Own-Operate-Maintain (BOOM) model. Capital cost is project-specific and figures are intake-specific, requiring site assay before a project model is fixed. Commissioning schedule and staffing: [требует уточнения из базы].
TRL 9 — проставлен Михаилом 2026-08-06.
— none of the three source versions states a TRL. What is documented instead is third-party verification of operating performance: SGS Inspection Report No. 210272 (2021, 0.845 kWh/m³), SGS Certificate No. 2305080850 (2023, 0.723 kWh/m³ plus product-water analysis within drinking limits), both metered and photo-documented, and PANKEMI Lab (2025) chemical analysis reports on the feed liquid. Platform status is held in ARBOK-VC (Vacuum Cracking).
Demand: VRFB is the leading long-duration (8–12 hour) storage option, with a market growing about 20 %/yr (source reference cites ~US$0.5B in 2025 rising to ~US$3B by 2035). Because vanadium is locked in the recirculating electrolyte rather than consumed, each gigawatt-hour of installed storage corresponds to tons of bound metal, and demand scales with installed capacity rather than annual turnover. More than 90 % of vanadium is consumed in high-strength steel — a stable commodity base — with VRFB as the growth vector.
Supply: China more than 50 % of production and dominant in refining; the United States fully import-reliant on ferrovanadium and pentoxide; vanadium designated a critical mineral. A domestic non-Chinese source, even modest in tonnage, carries strategic value disproportionate to its commodity price.
Adjacent market: multi-contaminant groundwater treatment across Western U.S. intakes, where removal by separate trains runs ~$0.5–1.5/m³, on the order of $5–15 M/yr for a large intake.
The product here is water, not metal. For an average stream of 1,000 m³/h (~10 Mm³/yr) at 21 µg/L V:
| Line | Figure |
|---|---|
| Recoverable vanadium | ~190 kg/yr |
| Vanadium price basis | ~$11/kg V₂O₅ — direct metal value is symbolic, treated as strategy rather than revenue |
| Uranium | Adds nuclear-fuel feedstock depending on the intake |
| Conventional multi-contaminant removal cost avoided | ~$0.5–1.5/m³ ≈ $5–15 M/yr for a large intake |
| OPEX coverage | Recovered sodium chloride covers the OPEX of the whole process |
| Hazardous-fraction disposal cost | Largely eliminated — toxicants exit in a small, separated, stabilized form, chromium as a product |
Net benefit is on the order of the avoided treatment cost — $5–15 M/yr per intake — plus clean water and the strategic metals (vanadium, uranium) on top. Capital cost is project-specific; delivery by purchase or BOOM. CAPEX figure: .
Metal revenue is symbolic: ~190 kg/yr of vanadium at ~$11/kg V₂O₅ from a 10 Mm³/yr intake — the case is strategic, and the financial model rests entirely on avoided treatment cost, salt and water.
Scope boundary: ARBOK does not smelt metal and delivers only a concentrate; conversion to V₂O₅, ferrovanadium or electrolyte depends on a separate downstream industry and on an offtake for the concentrate.
Site dependence: all figures are intake-specific and require site assay; vanadium ranges from a 21 µg/L median to 70 µg/L in the San Joaquin Valley alone, and the uranium contribution is present only where the aquifer carries it.
Regulatory and licensing: the uranium concentrate is a licensed material; the chromium and arsenic fractions must qualify as products or stabilized wastes under the applicable regime.
Market: vanadium supply is dominated by China (>50 % of production and refining), which sets the price the project is measured against; the VRFB growth case rests on installed-capacity projections.
CAPEX and TRL are not documented in the sources: [требует уточнения из базы].
ARBOK-Indium · ARBOK-Scandium-REE · ARBOK-Copper-Waters · ARBOK-CRYSTALLIZER · ARBOK-VC (Vacuum Cracking)
Related technologies
Sludge from mine water and landfill leachate is normally paid for twice: once to generate it through neutralization or filtration, and again to haul it…
TEG (ТРГ, thermally expanded graphite) is the graphene-like carbon material ARBOK produces in-house by its own process.
Arbok-Potassium converts agricultural pruning waste and beached sargassum into potassium carbonate (K₂CO₃) and metallic potassium (K⁰) using the ARBOK vacuum desalinator and a proprietary engineered-carbon…
Partnership pathway