Stormwater Treatment Device Patents: Who Leads, White Space 2026
- One leader stands well clear of a long tail. the top assignee holds 23 records against a fifth-place count of just 3 and a tenth-place count of 1 across the 18 ranked companies.
- Filing has plateaued, not accelerated. the last complete comparison shows 0% growth from 2021 to 2024, after a 2023 peak of 14 filings.
- Claim space is concentrated in three IPC subclasses. E03F sewerage and B01D separation processes together cover the large majority of the 63 records, leaving hydraulic engineering and water-supply classes barely touched.
Filing growth compares 2021 (2 records) with 2024 (2) — 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 this landscape covers
Stormwater quality treatment devices sit at the intersection of civil drainage infrastructure and separation engineering: hydrodynamic separators that spin out sediment, filter cartridges that trap fine particulates and hydrocarbons, and bypass structures that route high flows around treatment media during storm surges. The claim scope in this dataset runs from tank geometry and vortex mechanics through to media replacement and field verification testing protocols that regulators increasingly require before a device can be certified for a jurisdiction. Sediment capture and oil-water separation are the two functional claims that recur most often across the corpus.
The 63 records in scope span 2015 through the middle of 2026, with the United States as the dominant receiving office, trailed by PCT filings and smaller counts in Canada, Europe, India and Australia. Because publication typically lags filing by around 18 months, the most recent one to two years in any trend understate actual filing activity.
Filing trend and technology composition
The two views below cover the same 63 records from different angles: one tracks when filings happened, the other tracks what they claim.
Filing trend, 2017–2026
Filings rose from 5 in 2017 to a peak of 14 in 2023, then eased; the 2021-to-2024 comparison shows 0% growth, and 2026 is still a partial year, so the apparent drop at the end of the chart is a publication-lag artefact rather than a confirmed decline.
IPC subclass distribution
E03F (sewerage) appears in 85.7% of the 63 records and B01D (separation processes) in 55.6%, meaning most filings claim both drainage-system integration and a filtration or separation mechanism in the same document; C02F (water and wastewater treatment) reaches 31.7%, while E02B, E03B and E04F each sit at 1.6%, marking them as barely explored adjacencies rather than settled ground.
Shares are the percentage of the 63 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Go deeper on Stormwater Quality Treatment Devices with Eureka
This page is one run against one query. Ask Eureka your own question about stormwater quality treatment devices and every answer comes back with the patent numbers behind it.
Try EurekaRepresentative and most-cited filings
US20230219021A1 — Stormwater treatment device
A stormwater treatment device includes a tank defining an internal volume and having an inlet and an outlet, a rotatable screen unit mounted within the tank, the rotatable screen unit defining a through path with an inlet end and an outlet end. The rotatable screen unit includes a screen structure with a plurality of screening openings for allowing passage of at least some stormwater from the through path outwardly through the screen structure while inhibiting passage of at least some trash items through the screen structure such that the trash items move along the through path from the inlet end to the outlet end. The stormwater treatment device may include both a normal treatment flow path.Filed by Contech Engineered Solutions LLC, published 2023-07-13.
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US20050184007A1 | Storm water treatment apparatus employing dual vortex separators | 67 |
| 2 | US7182874B2 | Storm water treatment apparatus employing dual vortex separators | 47 |
| 3 | US20160160489A1 | Hydrodynamic separator | 24 |
| 4 | US10183240B1 | Nutrient removal filtration system and method | 16 |
| 5 | US10344466B2 | Hydrodynamic separator for stormwater treatment | 15 |
| 6 | US20190078310A1 | Hydrodynamic separator for stormwater treatment | 14 |
| 7 | US20130206661A1 | Fluid stream hydrodynamic separator with high flow bypass | 9 |
| 8 | US20180185770A1 | Hydrodynamic separator | 8 |
| 9 | US20190210894A1 | Hydrodynamic separators, assemblies and methods for storm water treatment | 6 |
| 10 | US9827510B2 | Hydrodynamic separator | 6 |
Citation counts reflect influence within the searched corpus and skew toward older filings; treat them as a signal of prior-art weight, not of current commercial relevance.
Each row carries its publication number; clicking a row searches Eureka by that number.
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Three patterns stand out once the ranking, the trend and the IPC composition are read together.
One assignee dominates, then a steep drop
The leading assignee's 23 records dwarf the fifth-place count of 3 and the tenth-place count of 1 across the 18 companies in the ranking. That gap suggests a single portfolio anchors much of the enforceable prior art in this space, while the remaining filers hold narrow, single-digit positions.
Filing has plateaued after a 2023 peak
Annual filings climbed from 5 in 2017 to a peak of 14 in 2023, but the 2021-to-2024 comparison lands at 0% growth. Read the 2025–2026 dip as incomplete publication data rather than a genuine slowdown.
Most filings stack drainage and separation claims together
E03F (sewerage) reaches 85.7% of the 63 records and B01D (separation processes) 55.6%; because a record can carry multiple classes, the overlap indicates that device claims routinely combine drainage-system integration with a filtration or separation mechanism rather than claiming either in isolation.
Co-filing is limited and inventor-centred
Only 10 co-assignee pairs appear across the corpus, with the strongest links repeating around a single named inventor across three separate pairings. That pattern points to individual-inventor cross-filings rather than structured joint ventures between companies.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to stormwater quality treatment devices, with the prior art for and against each one.
Who holds the ground, and where it opens up
The ranking is short — 18 companies in total — and heavily skewed toward one filer, which narrows the field for anyone assessing freedom to operate.
A single portfolio leads by a wide margin
The top-ranked assignee's 23 records place it well ahead of the rest of the 18-company ranking, giving it the broadest base of prior art to search against before filing in adjacent claim areas.
A cluster of mid-tier filers holds narrow positions
Fifth place in the ranking sits at just 3 records, indicating that beyond the leader, most companies have staked out a small, specific slice of the claim space rather than a broad portfolio.
Single-filing entrants make up the tail
Tenth place drops to a single record, and the pattern continues from there — a long tail of entrants with one filing each, typical of a field where individual engineers and small firms patent specific mechanical fixes.
Recent-year activity has gone quiet across several filers
Multiple assignees, including the sector's largest historical filers, show zero filings in the latest tracked year. Combined with the overall 0% growth from 2021 to 2024, this points to a mature filing base rather than an active filing race, though publication lag means the most recent year always understates true activity.
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| StormTrap LLC | 0 | -100% |
| BIO CLEAN ENVIRONMENTAL SERVICES INC | 0 | — |
| Contech Engineered Solutions LLC | 0 | — |
| STEINHARDT JORG MICHAEL | 0 | — |
| KRISTAR ENTERPRISES | 0 | — |
| STEIN WALTER G | 0 | — |
| PERRY SCOTT D | 0 | — |
| OLDCASTLE INFRASTRUCTURE INC | 0 | — |
Where to take this analysis
The dataset points to a mature, concentrated field with specific gaps still open for new claims.
Map freedom to operate against the leader's portfolio
With one assignee holding 23 of the ranked records, any new device claim in tank geometry or screening mechanisms should be checked against that portfolio first.
Explore the assignee portfolio in EurekaTest claims against the under-claimed subclasses
E02B, E03B and E04F each sit at 1.6% of records, well below E03F and B01D — a strong signal for where narrower, defensible claims may still be available.
Run a white-space search in EurekaTrack the most-cited prior art before drafting
The dual-vortex separator filings carry the highest citation counts in this corpus and anchor much of the downstream claim language in hydrodynamic separation.
Review cited prior art in EurekaCommon questions on stormwater treatment device patents
One assignee leads the 18-company ranking with 23 records, well ahead of the fifth-place holder at 3 and the tenth-place holder at 1. That gap means a freedom-to-operate check in this field should start with the leader's portfolio before looking at the rest of the field, since the remaining companies each hold comparatively narrow positions. The ranking covers only the assignees the dataset returns, not every company active in the space.
Filings grew from 5 in 2017 to a peak of 14 in 2023, and the most recent complete comparison, 2021 to 2024, shows 0% growth. Later years in the chart show fewer records, but that is a publication-lag artefact — publication typically trails actual filing by around 18 months, so 2025 and 2026 data are still incomplete. Read the trend as a plateau after a 2023 peak, not as a confirmed decline.
The two dominant IPC subclasses are E03F, sewerage, covering 85.7% of the 63 records in scope, and B01D, separation processes such as filtration, covering 55.6%. C02F, water and wastewater treatment, appears in 31.7%. Because most devices combine a drainage-system claim with a separation mechanism, many records fall into more than one of these classes at once, which is why the shares add up to well over 100%.
US20230219021A1, filed by Contech Engineered Solutions LLC and published 2023-07-13, claims a stormwater treatment device built around a rotatable screen unit inside a tank, with a defined through path that lets water pass through screening openings while retaining trash items and moving them along a separate flow path. It also describes a normal treatment flow path alongside this trash-handling mechanism. Anyone designing a rotating-screen or dual-flow-path device should review this filing's specific screen-structure and through-path language closely, since that combination is the narrow feature actually claimed rather than screening or bypass flow in general.
The clearest gaps sit outside the three dominant IPC subclasses: E02B (hydraulic and waterway engineering), E03B (water supply and distribution) and E04F (building finishing) each appear in only 1.6% of the 63 records. Functional areas like field verification testing protocols and media replacement mechanisms for filter cartridges are also thinly claimed relative to core sediment-capture and separation claims. A first claim in one of these adjacencies, tied to a specific mechanical or testing feature, has considerably less prior art to design around than a new hydrodynamic separator claim would.
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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.