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The financing enables the development of Anfiro’s energy-efficient water membranes shown to reduce the cost and energy of desalination and water treatment, providing affordable freshwater and reducing greenhouse gas emissions at global scale. The technology was developed at and licensed from Purdue University and the University of Notre Dame to Anfiro.

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As the climate changes and existing freshwater sources are stressed, freshwater scarcity is only expected to worsen in the years ahead. Anfiro is attacking this problem by developing novel water filtration membranes that reduce the cost of water treatment. Anfiro’s next-generation membranes can increase the energy efficiency and decrease the cost of seawater desalination by up to 35 percent. As a result, seawater desalination and small-scale decentralized water treatment could become economically viable solutions for the first time in many locations around the world. Anfiro’s membranes can also be retrofitted directly into existing treatment plants to dramatically boost their efficiency and output capacity

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“Anfiro’s technology promises large operating and capital expenditure improvements over the state of the art. Its seed round will enable the team to produce full-scale membrane prototypes by 2018,” explains Sarah Kearney, PRIME’s founder and executive director. “When Anfiro achieves commercial scale, its solution will not only greatly reduce global greenhouse gas emissions through energy savings, but also increase access to affordable and clean freshwater in water-stressed communities. PRIME’s philanthropic partners were enthused to learn that in addition to its climate benefits, Anfiro also promises large-scale health and poverty alleviation benefits, as a solution for communities that cannot afford conventional water infrastructure.”

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Anfiro™ is a water technology startup addressing global freshwater scarcity. We are using our self-assembling polymers to create chlorine resistant and high permeability reverse osmosis (RO) and nanofiltration (NF) membranes that vastly outperform current membrane technology. This enables us to reduce significantly the cost of water treatment and desalination, enabling clean and affordable water for a better tomorrow.

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