Produced Water Desalination Patents: Top Companies & Trends 2026
- Filings up 240% from 2021 to 2024, climbing from 5 to 17 records a year before the most recent, still-incomplete years.
- One assignee holds 11 of 46 records, but the top 10 together already cover 93.5% of the field — there is little room left outside that group.
- Separation and water-treatment classes dominate, with B01D and C02F each appearing on over half of all 46 records, while thermal and control-system routes stay in single digits.
Filing growth compares 2021 (5 records) with 2024 (17) — 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. Top-5 share is the combined record count of the five largest assignees divided by all 46 records in scope (CR5), not by the ranked leaders only.
What this landscape covers
Produced water desalination and reuse sits at the intersection of oilfield water management and industrial separation engineering. The scope tracked here covers 46 published records spanning membrane-based routes such as forward osmosis, thermal approaches like mechanical vapour recompression and brine concentration, and the treatment chemistry that supports them — silica scale inhibition, boron removal, and zero liquid discharge system design. The search string ties these technical routes together with the produced water application, so the corpus reflects patenting aimed specifically at treating oilfield-associated water rather than general desalination.
Coverage runs from 2015 through the 2026 cut-off, with the most recent one to two years understated because publication typically lags filing by around 18 months. Readers should treat 2024 as the most recent year with a reasonably complete count.
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Filing trend and technology composition
Two views of the same 46 records: how filing activity has moved year over year, and which IPC subclasses the underlying technology falls into.
A sharp climb through 2024
Annual filings rose from 5 in 2017 to a peak of 17 in 2024, a 240% increase over the 2021-to-2024 span. The 2025 and 2026 counts are still filling in as later publications land, so the apparent tail-off should not be read as a slowdown.
Separation and treatment classes carry the field
B01D (separation processes) appears on 60.9% of the 46 records and C02F (water and wastewater treatment) on 52.2%, confirming that most patenting concentrates on filtration and treatment mechanics rather than the wells themselves — E21B (earth and rock drilling) touches only 8.7%. Thermal, control-system and materials classes (F24D, G05B, C09K) each sit at 6.5% or below, and steam generation (F22B) and direct-contact heat exchange (F28C) each appear on a single record.
Shares are the percentage of the 46 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Go deeper on Produced Water Desalination and Reuse with Eureka
This page is one run against one query. Ask Eureka your own question about produced water desalination and reuse and every answer comes back with the patent numbers behind it.
Try EurekaRepresentative and most-cited filings
Controlled produced water desalination for enhanced hydrocarbon recovery
Processes, systems, and techniques for treating produced water drawn from a subterranean formation. The produced water contains dissolved solids and magnesium, calcium, and sodium ions, and is desalinated using an electrically-driven membrane separation apparatus with alternating anion- and cation-exchange membranes defining opposing product and concentrate chambers. Desalinating involves flowing the produced water through the product chamber, flowing a second water through the concentrate chamber, and applying an electric potential across the membranes.Filed by Saltworks Technologies Inc., published 2021-07-29 as US20210230024A1.
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US20080164206A1 | Method and apparatus for removing minerals from a water source | 14 |
| 2 | US20080029456A1 | Method and apparatus for removing minerals from a water source | 12 |
| 3 | US20130032538A1 | Systems and methods for forward osmosis fluid purification | 11 |
| 4 | US20220236700A1 | Modelling of a fluid treatment system | 6 |
| 5 | US11466870B1 | Combined heat, power, water and waste system | 6 |
| 6 | US20200270157A1 | System and method for desalinating and removing pollutants from produced water | 6 |
| 7 | WO2018076115A1 | Controlled produced water desalination for enhanced hydrocarbon recovery | 5 |
| 8 | US20210230024A1 | Controlled produced water desalination for enhanced hydrocarbon recovery | 4 |
| 9 | WO2025029830A1 | High performance composite membranes | 2 |
| 10 | US20220032241A1 | Methods of preparing dual-layer polyvinylidene fluoride hollow fiber membranes and uses thereof | 2 |
Citation counts favour older filings simply because they have had more time to accumulate references — read them as a signal of influence within this searched set, not as a measure of which technology is winning today.
Each row carries its publication number; clicking a row searches Eureka by that number.
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Browse MCP servers →What the numbers mean for filing strategy
Three read-throughs from the trend, the class mix, and the citation table.
The field only recently accelerated
Annual filings sat at 5 as late as 2021 and reached 17 by 2024. That is a young, fast-moving filing curve rather than a mature, settled one — claim scope in the core separation classes is still being actively staked out.
Little room outside the established group
The ranked leaders account for 43 of the 46 records in scope, with the single leader alone holding 11. A new entrant is more likely to find room by working a specific mechanism or sub-application than by competing head-on in the broad separation claims already staked out.
Separation mechanics, not well hardware, is where the claims sit
B01D and C02F together dominate the corpus while E21B (drilling) appears on only 8.7% of records. Filing strategy in this space is a membrane-and-treatment-chemistry game more than a downhole-hardware one.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to produced water desalination and reuse, with the prior art for and against each one.
Who is filing, and where the gaps sit
Thirteen assignees make up the ranked field, with a steep drop-off after the leader and a long tail of single-digit filers.
One filer sits well ahead of the field
The leading assignee holds 11 of the 46 records in scope, roughly a quarter of everything published. Recent-year momentum data shows this same assignee still filing in the latest year while several other named assignees show none, suggesting the gap may be widening rather than closing.
A moderate mid-tier, then a long tail
Fifth place holds 4 records and tenth place holds 2, meaning the drop from leader to mid-field is steep and the tail from sixth to thirteenth is thin. Most of the ranked companies are oilfield operators, water-technology specialists, or university research arms rather than diversified industrials.
Momentum has narrowed to a smaller group
Several assignees that appear in the ranking, including a major integrated oil producer, show zero filings in the latest tracked year while the leader continues filing. That pattern is worth checking against each company's broader portfolio before concluding they have exited the space.
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| The Regents of the University of California | 3 | — |
| Southwest Turf Solutions | 0 | — |
| Clean H2O Tech LLC | 0 | — |
| New Mexico Tech University Research Park Corp | 0 | — |
| HYDROZONIX LLC | 0 | — |
| Chevron U.S.A. Inc. | 0 | — |
| InnoCorps Research | 0 | — |
| Saudi Arabian Oil Co. (Saudi Aramco) | 0 | -100% |
Where to take this analysis
The filing curve and the class mix both point to a field still being actively defined rather than one that has settled into fixed claim territory.
Watch the thermal and control-system branches
F24D, G05B, F22B and F28C together cover thermal integration and process control but each sits at 6.5% of records or below. If mechanical vapour recompression and brine-concentration deployment keeps scaling, these classes are the ones most likely to see new filing activity next.
Explore thermal route filings in EurekaTrack the leader's recent filings closely
With one assignee holding roughly a quarter of the corpus and still filing in the latest year, its newest applications are the closest available signal for where the broader field's claim boundaries are heading.
Set up assignee tracking in EurekaRe-run the citation view periodically
The most-cited records in this set are concentrated in older filings, which is an artefact of citation lag rather than a judgement on current relevance. Newer high-value filings will only surface as citations accumulate.
Monitor citation shifts in EurekaCommon questions on produced water desalination patents
One assignee leads the ranked field with 11 of the 46 records in scope, well ahead of the rest of the group. The top 5 assignees together account for 65.2% of all records, and the top 10 account for 93.5%, so the field is concentrated among a relatively small number of filers rather than spread evenly. Anyone entering this space should expect to compete directly against, or design around, that leading portfolio rather than finding wide-open ground at the top of the ranking.
Filings grew sharply from 5 in 2021 to 17 in 2024, a 240% increase, which points to an accelerating rather than a maturing field. The counts for 2025 and 2026 look lower, but that is expected: publication typically lags filing by about 18 months, so the most recent years are still incomplete in any patent dataset. Treat 2024 as the last year with a reasonably reliable count and wait for later years to fill in before reading a slowdown into the trend.
Separation processes (IPC class B01D) and water and wastewater treatment (C02F) dominate, appearing on 60.9% and 52.2% of the 46 records respectively. Earth and rock drilling (E21B) appears on only 8.7% of records, meaning most patent activity targets the treatment mechanics — membranes, filtration, chemistry — rather than downhole or well-related hardware. Thermal and control-system classes such as F24D and G05B remain minor by comparison, each at 6.5% or below.
The IPC composition shows several branches with only single-digit representation across the 46 records: thermal integration (F24D), process control and modelling (G05B), steam generation (F22B), and direct-contact heat exchange (F28C). These sit well below the dominant separation and treatment classes, suggesting the field's core membrane and chemistry claims are more crowded than its thermal-process and control-system counterparts. A first mover with a specific mechanism in one of these thinner branches has more room to establish a distinct claim position.
US20210230024A1 is a Saltworks Technologies filing, published 2021-07-29, covering a process for desalinating produced water using an electrically-driven membrane separation apparatus with alternating anion- and cation-exchange membranes. The claims describe flowing produced water through a product chamber and a second water stream through an adjacent concentrate chamber while applying an electric potential across the membrane stack. It is a useful reference point for understanding how electrodialysis-style approaches to produced water are being claimed in this corpus, though its exact scope should be checked against the full claim set before relying on it for freedom-to-operate purposes.
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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.
Nothing on this page constitutes an exhaustive prior-art, novelty, freedom-to-operate, or validity search, nor does it constitute legal, financial, investment, or professional advice, and it should not be relied upon as such. Any patent, commercial, or strategic decision should be verified independently and reviewed with qualified patent, legal, and domain professionals. Patsnap makes no warranties, express or implied, as to the accuracy, completeness, or fitness for any particular purpose of the information presented.
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.