Desalination Pretreatment Patents: Who Leads, White Space 2026
- One leader, then a long tail. the top-ranked assignee holds 13 records against a fifth-place figure of just 2, across 9 ranked companies total.
- Filing peaked in 2017 at 6 records and the 2021-to-2024 span (the last complete years) shows a -50% change, from 2 down to 1.
- Control and monitoring classes are catching up with filtration. G05D (control of non-electric variables) appears in 32.3% of records, nearly matching G01N testing at 38.7%.
Filing growth compares 2021 (2 records) with 2024 (1) — a three-year span. 2024 is the most recent year we treat as complete: publication lags filing by roughly 18 months, so 2025 onwards are still filling in and any growth rate that ends there would understate the field.
What the desalination pretreatment patent record shows
Desalination pretreatment covers the filtration, flotation and monitoring steps that condition seawater before it reaches a reverse-osmosis or thermal desalination stage — dissolved air flotation, ultrafiltration pretreatment, silt density index measurement, algal bloom response and coagulant dosing all sit inside this scope. The dataset behind this page holds 31 published records filed or published between 2015 and mid-2026, indexed against the same 9 ranked assignees that anchor the competitive picture below. It is a small, technically dense field rather than a sprawling one: most records carry a C02F water-treatment classification, and a majority also carry a B01D separation-process classification, meaning the two disciplines are usually claimed together rather than separately.
Because publication lags filing by roughly 18 months, the most recent one or two years in any trend understate real filing activity — treat 2025 and 2026 figures as still filling in, not as a genuine drop-off.
Filing trend and technology composition
Two views of the same 31-record set: how filing activity moved year over year, and how records distribute across IPC subclasses.
Filing trend, 2017–2026
Filing peaked at 6 records in 2017. The most recent complete comparison — 2021's 2 records against 2024's 1 — shows a -50% change; years after 2024 are still incomplete because of publication lag and should not be read as a continued decline.
IPC subclass composition
C02F (water and wastewater treatment) appears in 93.5% of the 31 records, and B01D (separation processes including filtration) in 61.3% — confirming that most filings combine a treatment claim with a physical separation mechanism. Monitoring and control classes (G01N, G05D, G05B) together account for a meaningful share, pointing to a real sub-cluster of sensing and automation claims rather than pure hardware claims. Shares sum above 100% because records commonly carry more than one class.
Shares are the percentage of the 31 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Go deeper on Desalination Pretreatment with Eureka
This page is one run against one query. Ask Eureka your own question about desalination pretreatment and every answer comes back with the patent numbers behind it.
Try EurekaThe most-cited records in scope
Apparatus and method for analyzing influence variable on membrane fouling of seawater desalination system
Filed by Doosan Heavy Industries & Construction, this application (US20180072588A1) describes selecting the dominant variables that drive membrane fouling in a seawater desalination system and deriving an equation from them, discarding low-influence variables along the way. It positions monitoring and predictive modelling as a distinct claim layer sitting on top of the physical filtration hardware.Published 2018-03-15
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US5316682A | Gas micronizer and purification system and related methods | 108 |
| 2 | US20140014562A1 | Dissolved air flotation-type pretreatment apparatus | 16 |
| 3 | US20230294038A1 | Sustainable desalination systems and methods | 14 |
| 4 | US20180072588A1 | Apparatus and method for analyzing influence variable on membrane fouling of seawater desalination system | 12 |
| 5 | WO2021226275A1 | Sustainable desalination systems and methods | 10 |
| 6 | EP3293151A1 | Apparatus and method for analyzing membrane fouling of seawater desalination system | 9 |
| 7 | US20160207803A1 | Method for pretreatment of wastewater and recreational water with nanocomposites and bridging polymers | 9 |
| 8 | US9440864B2 | Dissolved air flotation-type pretreatment apparatus | 7 |
| 9 | US10472254B2 | Apparatus and method for analyzing influence variable on membrane fouling of seawater desalination system | 6 |
| 10 | WO2015022695A1 | Method for pretreatment of wastewater and recreational water with nanocomposites and bridging polymers | 5 |
Citation counts inside this corpus reward older filings that have had more time to accumulate references — read them as a signal of influence on the field's prior art, not as a ranking of current commercial importance.
Each row carries its publication number; clicking a row searches Eureka by that number.
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Three findings worth acting on before drafting new claims in this space.
One assignee well ahead, then a thin field
The top-ranked assignee holds 13 records; by fifth place the count is down to 2. With only 9 companies in the ranked set, this is a field where a single active filer can dominate the visible prior art in a given sub-branch, but where most other participants have filed only once or twice.
Activity has thinned since the 2017 peak
Filing peaked at 6 records in 2017 and, using the last two complete years available, moved from 2 in 2021 to 1 in 2024 — a -50% change. Momentum data for the ranked assignees confirms flat or -100% year-on-year activity for several of the more active filers, though 2025-2026 figures are still incomplete.
Monitoring and control claims are a real second cluster
Beyond the dominant C02F and B01D treatment classes, G01N (testing, including silt density index work) and G05D (non-electric variable control) each cover roughly a third of the 31 records. That is a meaningful share for what is often treated as a peripheral topic to core filtration hardware.
Filing is spread across a handful of offices, not concentrated in one
United States (8) and the European Patent Office (6) lead receiving-office counts, with China (4), Germany (3), Austria (2) and Australia (2) also represented. No single office dominates the way the top assignee dominates the company ranking.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to desalination pretreatment, with the prior art for and against each one.
Who is filing, and where the gaps sit
The ranked assignee set is small — 9 companies — and recent-year momentum has gone flat or negative across the most active of them, which is itself informative for anyone deciding whether to enter now.
A clear leader without a comparable second filer
The top-ranked assignee's 13 records sit well above the field; the next tier of activity drops sharply, down to 2 records by fifth place. That gap suggests the leader has staked out a defensible position in at least one sub-branch rather than the field being contested at the top.
Recent-year activity has gone quiet across the ranked set
Several of the more active assignees, including the pairing behind the strongest co-assignee link in the dataset, show 0 filings in the latest year and a -100% year-on-year change. This is consistent with the overall -50% filing trend from 2021 to 2024, though the newest years are still filling in due to publication lag.
Co-filing is rare in this dataset
Only one co-assignee pairing recurs with a count above one, linking two related engineering entities on shared filings. Outside that pair, the ranked assignees appear to file independently rather than in joint ventures or cross-licensed programmes.
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| Gaveish-Galilee Bio Applications Ltd. | 0 | — |
| Doosan Heavy Industries & Construction Co., Ltd. | 0 | — |
| Environmental Water Minerals Company | 0 | — |
| Shenzhen China General Nuclear Engineering Design Co., Ltd. | 0 | -100% |
| China General Nuclear Power Engineering Co., Ltd. | 0 | -100% |
| WOO SUNG WOO | 0 | — |
| Suzhou Kehuan Environmental Protection Technology Co., Ltd. | 0 | -100% |
| Suzhou Five Stars Special Ultrafiltration Membrane Technology Co., Ltd. | 0 | -100% |
Where to take this analysis
The dataset points to a concentrated leader, a thinning filing trend through 2024, and a real monitoring/control sub-cluster alongside the core filtration claims.
Check freedom-to-operate against the leader's portfolio
With one assignee holding 13 of the ranked records, any new filing in dissolved air flotation or ultrafiltration pretreatment should be checked against that portfolio specifically, not just the field average.
Run a freedom-to-operate scan in EurekaTrack the monitoring and control sub-cluster separately
G01N and G05D classes cover roughly a third of records each — treat membrane-fouling prediction and dosing control as a distinct claim strategy from the physical filtration hardware.
Explore this cluster in EurekaRe-check filing momentum once 2025-2026 data settles
Publication lag means the current -50% (2021-2024) reading is the most reliable growth figure available; revisit once more recent years complete.
Set an alert in EurekaCommon questions about desalination pretreatment patents
Among the 9 companies in the ranked assignee set, one leader holds 13 records, well ahead of the rest of the field — by fifth place the count is down to just 2. That gap indicates a concentrated position in at least part of the pretreatment space rather than an evenly contested market. Anyone entering the field should check that leader's specific claims before assuming open space, since the rest of the ranking is a long tail of low-volume filers.
Filing peaked at 6 records in 2017 and, using the most recent years that can be treated as complete, moved from 2 records in 2021 to 1 in 2024 — a -50% change. Figures for 2025 and 2026 look lower still, but publication typically lags filing by around 18 months, so those years are not yet reliable evidence of a further decline. The honest reading is a field that has cooled somewhat since its 2017 peak, not one that has stopped.
C02F, the water and wastewater treatment classification, appears in 93.5% of the 31 records in scope, and B01D, covering separation processes such as filtration, appears in 61.3%. Testing and control classifications (G01N, G05D, G05B) also show up frequently, pointing to a real sub-cluster of monitoring and automation claims layered on top of the physical filtration and flotation hardware. Because records often carry multiple classifications, these shares add up to more than 100%.
The technology composition data shows flotation (B03D) and chemical/catalytic processes (B01J) each appear in under 10% of the 31 records, despite dissolved air flotation and coagulant dosing being named directly in the field's own search scope. Predictive control loops for backwash frequency and coagulant dosing, and sensing approaches for algal bloom response, look similarly under-represented relative to their technical relevance. These are the branches worth a closer prior-art check before assuming they are occupied.
The United States leads with 8 published records, followed by the European Patent Office with 6, then China with 4 and Germany with 3; Austria and Australia each show 2. This spread across six offices, without one dominating the way the top assignee dominates the company ranking, suggests filers are pursuing multi-jurisdiction protection rather than concentrating on a single home market.
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Disclaimer. This page is generated from Patsnap Eureka data drawn from a limited snapshot of global patent and scientific-literature records, and is provided for general information and reference only.
Patent data carries inherent limitations: recent filings (typically the most recent 18–24 months) are under-counted due to standard publication lag; counts may be reported at either a patent-family or a patent-record basis and are not always directly comparable; classification, applicant-name, and citation data may contain errors, duplicates, or omissions; and the underlying search query defines and constrains the scope shown. As a result, the analysis may be incomplete or inaccurate and may not reflect the full technology landscape.
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Machine translation. Assignee and organisation names originally recorded in Chinese, Japanese or Korean have been rendered into English by an AI translation step so that the tables stay readable. These renderings are best-effort and may not match a company’s registered English name; the original name is what the underlying patent record carries, and it is what any Eureka query launched from this page uses.