A consortium of GE (Fairfield, Conn.; www.ge.com) and Penrice Soda Holdings Ltd. (Osborne, South Australia; www.penrice.com.au) today announced an agreement with Australian coal-seam gas producer QGC Pty. Limited to design, build and operate a brine pilot plant at Penrice’s chemical facility in Osborne, South Australia. The brine plant is part of a wider initiative by the coal-seam gas industry to investigate the technical and commercial viability of producing products, such as table salt and soda ash, from brine, a byproduct of coal-seam gas water treatment.
The primary objective of the brine pilot plant is to demonstrate the ability of the GE-Penrice process to extract and selectively precipitate salts such as sodium bicarbonate, sodium carbonate and sodium chloride from the final brine streams. The plant will be operational in early 2012 and will provide new opportunities for the management of coal-seam gas water.
The BPP will be based on technology developed by the GE and Penrice Consortium, for the purpose of extracting salts from coal-seam gas water and produce commercial grades of sodium bicarbonate, soda ash and sodium chloride.