Water recycling and disposal companies are seeing great opportunities doing business with oil and gas companies in North America. Start-ups that provide such services to oil and gas well operators are growing at an astounding rate and capitalizing on the needs of the vast energy industry for water treatment and recycling.
According to Alberta Oil magazine, there is growing demand for companies providing a full range of services for wastewater treatment. Figures quoted by Bloomberg News show that U.S. oilfields produce approximately 21 billion barrels of wastewater annually. In 2012, the latest data available, 52 percent of Canadian producers dealt with their wastewater in-house. But taking care of wastewater is enormous upfront cost for oil and gas companies, so more and more of them are looking for specialist companies that can do it for them, both in Canada and in the United States, said Jeanie Oudin, industry analyst with Wood Mackenzie.
One of these fast-growing companies is Calgary-based Secure Energy Services Inc. Its chief executive Rene Amirault explained that the market offers unprecedented opportunities. Most of Secure's growth happened organically, by expanding to new locations and by adding new services to its portfolio. Organic growth takes more time but for companies with sufficient capital available, there are faster ways to advance on the market and claim a larger share, for example by acquisitions, he said.
