Report: “frack” water management market to reach $9 billion by 2020

   The global market for managing the water generated by hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking,” in unconventional gas exploration and production (E&P) operations will grow to $9 billion per year by 2020, but the field of vendors serving the market is rapidly becoming overcrowded, according to a recent report by Lux Research (Boston, MA). “Fracking represents a significant water treatment challenge; hydrocarbons, heavy metals, scalants, microbes, and salts in produced and flowback water from shale gas wells represent a water treatment challenge on par with the most difficult industrial wastewaters,” said Brent Giles, Lux Research analyst and the lead author of the report. “While the opportunity is large, only a few companies are really positioned to profit. Meanwhile, nearly every start-up we talk to is going after frack water, regardless of their technology, and many of them are going to come to grief.”