ionliQ - the revolutionary demineralisation system

There are various ways to desalinate and treat water. With the ionliQ desalination system, Grünbeck has now developed a revolutionary electrochemical process that is particularly environmentally friendly and can be used in a variety of ways. Housed in a compact frame module, commissioning and handling are extremely simple. The ionliQ will be available from August 2024.

Grünbeck has always set itself the goal of making water treatment better and more effective. The Höchstädt-based company is constantly researching and developing new solutions. The latest result is the ionliQ desalination plant, which uses membrane-based capacitive deionisation (MCDI) as an electrochemical process and relies on electricity as the driving force.

Grünbeck's new MCDI system has a wide range of possible applications. It can be used for the production of cooling lubricants as well as in water jet systems or for hydrogen production. It can also be used to treat water for the catering industry, for air humidification and for sterilisation in hospitals and laboratories. It can also be useful to install the ionliQ system upstream of demineralisation cartridges (mixed-bed exchangers) in order to significantly increase their service life.

The ionliQ demineralisation system can remove both anions and cations. The demineralisation performance is adjustable and the energy consumption (0.5 to 1.0 kWh/m3) is many times lower compared to reverse osmosis (3 to 4 kWh/m3). There is no need to add salt or chemicals with this process. The system technology used is simple and robust. Another advantage of the ionliQ demineralisation system is that there is no need to pre-treat the water in most applications.

How the ionliQ works
The new Grünbeck desalination system generates a DC electric field between two capacitive electrodes in which ions move to the respective poles. During the treatment process, adsorption and desorption phases alternate continuously, thus enabling continuous operation.

During the adsorption phase, which is crucial for desalination, the raw water passes through two oppositely charged electrodes. Positively charged ions are attracted to the negative electrode, negatively charged ions to the positive one. The adsorbed salts (e.g. chloride, nitrate, sulphate as well as calcium, magnesium, sodium or potassium) are stored in a layer of activated carbon. The result: pure water with a reduced total salt content.

Finally, the desorption phase is important for the regeneration of the cell. This means that the polarity of the electric field is reversed. The electrodes and the stored ions repel each other, the latter are released into the water and flushed into the channel.