McIlvaine Says Asia Holds 45% of Macrofiltration Market
Sales of liquid macrofiltration equipment and media will reach $5.2 billion next year. Of that total, $2.3 billion or 45 percent of the sales will be in Asia. This is the latest forecast in the Liquid Filtration and Media World Markets published by the McIlvaine Company.
One of the biggest drivers will be the construction of sewage treatment plants in China. In the just completed 11th five-year plan (2006-2010), China doubled its secondary sewage treatment capacity. This pace will continue through the 12th five-year plan. Much of the sludge dewatering is being accomplished by belt filter presses. The Asian market for belt filter presses will be just under $300 million in 2011.
Granular media filters are the largest equipment segment in liquid macrofiltration. They are used to purify surface water to provide municipal drinking water. Throughout Asia there is a major effort to provide safe water to all citizens.
Recessed chamber filter presses are widely used in the chemical and mining industries. Asia leads the world in the purchases of this type of filter. Bag filters are used in chemical and metal working industries. They are also used for the purification of produced water in oil and gas extraction. This is a big market for filter media. The replacement bag market in Asia will be over $200 million in 2011.
A fast growing segment of liquid macrofiltration is the automatic backwashing filter. This filter uses screens or disks and is replacing bag filters in some applications. It also competes with liquid cartridges (not considered part of macrofiltration). These backwashing filters are used in irrigation, metal working and many other applications.
Also included in macrofiltration are drum and disk filters used in mining applications. Leaf filters are used along with diatomaceous earth to filter beverages. Gravity belt filters are used to filter chemicals and also gypsum crystals. China is buying more belt filters for power plant scrubber gypsum dewatering than the rest of the world combined.