Water & Wastewater Asia September/October 2019

14 | IN PERSON
Silvertex:
Sometimes,
less is
more
In the age of the Internet of Things (IoT)
and the ever-growing push towards
Industry 4.0, plant owners constantly
seek better, more advanced solutions to
their problems – inadvertently forgetting
that sometimes, the best solutions might
just be the simplest. Here, Silvertex
Aqua offers an ingenious solution
to aid the process of disinfection in
the water treatment process, where
biocides or UV light are commonly used.
A
silver-coated 3D textile, Silvertex works without energy or
repeat doses to protect water against bacterial contamination
and biofilm growth, over a period of up to two years. The
material was developed in collaboration with the Technical University
of Dresden and is produced in Germany.
Birgit Dursch, founder and executive partner of Silvertex Aqua,
explained, “Silvertex is not a membrane, filter or disinfectant. We
use the microbiological effect of silver ions in liquids, and we can
keep water quality good for a long time with a very low amount of
silver ions in the water.”
How Silvertex works is based off the principle of avoidance – the
metallic silver attached to the silver-coated thread acts as a reservoir
for generating and regularly releasing Ag+ ions in the water to
decontaminate the water and inhibit the growth of bacteria.
Dursch said, “The antibacterial effect of silver has been well known
since the middle ages – these dark, shiny fibres on the Silvertex mat
are silver-coated plastic fibres, and with this 3D mesh structure, we
are able to bring a huge silver contact surface into the water. One
square metre of this material brings us about 24 square metres of
silver contact surface, and for this we need a very low amount of
silver, about 6-12 grams per square metre.”
In this way, Dursch explained, the textile acts as a substitute for
biocides, and reduces biofilm growth in drinking, production, cooling,
process and industrial water systems.
Birgit Dursch, Founder and Executive Partner of Silvertex Aqua
“In the area of drinking water, you normally have a gap between
water production and consumption: You produce water, but not all
the water will be consumed in time. So, you store the water, you fill it
up into water trucks or big tanks. And the water stands in pipes – in
this way the water gets contaminated, the bacteria, viruses, fungi
and spores are able to grow in the water again, in the water that the
customer is drinking. Otherwise, the customer will have a problem
with biofilms in the water supply network.
Water & Wastewater Asia • September / October 2019