For more than 35 years, WaterSurplus has tirelessly strived to provide creative solutions for challenging problems. We began by transforming surplus water industry inventory into valuable assets. The company grew into a technology innovator, developing groundbreaking systems such as the ImpactRO™ brackish water reverse osmosis system and NanoStack™ membranes. These technologies have reduced membrane fouling, lowered operational costs, and improved sustainability.
Today, we are proud to introduce our latest breakthrough—NanoScope™.
A Technology Breakthrough
NanoScope is a powerful membrane monitoring system and now the latest piece in WaterSurplus’s packaged RO solution, ImpactRO. The system monitors membrane performance at an unprecedented depth—detecting performance loss well before traditional metrics, such as trending normalized permeate flux. In practice, this means that NanoScope can detect fouling events hours or days before that event alters the system’s overall performance.
Once a fouling event is detected through NanoScope, the WaterSurplus team or the local operator can implement one of ImpactRO’s fouling prevention measures. These interventions can prevent fouling events from escalating to a point where an unplanned cleaning is required. Examples of prevention measures include:
- Micro-Disruptions – Brief, intermittent bursts of feedwater that disrupt the concentration polarization layer, increasing the crossflow velocity to the tail membranes, flushing scale and foulants to drain while the system remains online.
- Intermittent Variable Recovery (IVR) – Automated modulation of the RO recovery setting to restore hydraulic balance and protect against fouling, even under changing feedwater conditions.
NanoScope achieves this rapid detection by measuring the flux and quality from only a small portion in an array, typically the final, tail element, where deteriorating performance first appears. By isolating and tracking performance on the most stressed part of an RO system, operators can identify, isolate, and address issues sooner, avoiding costly unplanned shutdowns.
With NanoScope and ImpactRO’s other unique characteristics, users can expect:
- Reduced membrane cleaning frequency
- Lower energy consumption
- Longer membrane life
- Less system downtime
- More consistent water quality
Development Journey
Five years ago, WaterSurplus was awarded a research grant from the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation to pilot advanced RO optimization concepts. In our 150 GPM containerized ImpactRO pilot unit, we tested a wide range of variables—scaling rates, fouling behavior, membrane types, and operational configurations.
As our team investigated the capabilities and combined benefits of our innovations, it became necessary to stress-test the system, purposefully and repeatedly inducing fouling and scaling events. It was clear that we needed to detect exactly when fouling events begin, rather than waiting for traditional performance metrics. It was at this time that our engineering team developed and patented the technology that would become NanoScope.
Initially, beta versions of the technology were included on some ImpactRO systems as a way for WaterSurplus to monitor the performance of the RO. But as the technology was refined, it became clear that the monitor itself was a significant feature. We realized it could be used to guide the ImpactRO’s existing interventions to restore the system’s active membrane surface area.
NanoScope’s launch marks the first time such predictive monitoring and online interventions have been integrated into a commercial RO platform.
Looking Ahead
The introduction of NanoScope is a step forward in our long-term vision: to drive the water industry toward higher efficiency, lower environmental impact, and greater operational resilience, even when treating challenging waters. By combining intelligent monitoring, advanced membrane technology, and online intervention, we are proving that RO systems can adapt to fouling events in real time and return to the original design parameters—not just respond after the fact.
At WaterSurplus, we will continue to look beyond current capabilities and imagine what is next. The future of high-efficiency water treatment depends on it.
Sidebar: Intelligent Interventions in ImpactRO™
- NanoStack™ Membranes – Engineered with a bioinspired, hydrophilic polymer coating that reduces scale adhesion and repels foulants.
- NanoScope™ Monitoring – Predicts, prevents, and reverses membrane fouling using advanced analytics.
- Feed-Forward Design – Balances flux evenly across all RO stages.
- Membrane Micro-Disruptions – Brief, intermittent bursts of feedwater that create a high cross-flow velocity state to clean membranes during operation.
- Intermittent Variable Recovery (IVR) – Automated recovery modulation to prevent and reverse fouling during fluctuating feed water conditions.
By Ian Tonner, Vice President of Engineering, WaterSurplus
