Collecting Heat from Wastewater
Established in 2009, SNS Energy is a Korean start-up company specializing in energy generation in an eco-friendly way. In particular, the company focuses on producing thermal energy by collecting heat from wastewater.
SNS Energy’s flagship product named “Ensaver” facilitates reusing the heat energy from wastewater by using a fully automated 4-stage filter which is designed to filter out impurities that are contained in the wastewater. According to an official at SNS Energy, the filter system mounted on Ensaver is much more effective in filtering out foreign substances than the traditional heat exchanger, enabling more collection of heat energy.
Kim Chan-ho, CEO of SNS Energy, said, “The companies that use and discharge a large amount of hot water, such as Dye processing factories and paper mills, can benefit from installing Ensaver to save more than 30 percent of their energy cost.”
In addition, its remote control system installed in Ensaver allows engineers at SNS Energy to deliver very efficient after-sales services to its clients.
When asked about his motives of establishing SNS Energy, CEO Kim recounted a short stint he spent for studying in 2008 at MIT in Boston where he met numerous foreign students. They led him to be exposed to extensive information about the budding industry of renewable energy.
He also said that he found a majority of people who were interested in eco-friendly energy sources for electrical energy while neglecting thermal energy. Kim said, “The Korean industry discharges a total of 5.3 million tons of wastewater annually, but nobody cares.” As a college student studying physics and struggling to find ways to replace fossil fuels as the main energy source, Kim decided to concentrate on research and development of renewable thermal energy.
SNS Energy is currently thriving both at home and abroad. The company aims at posting 12 billion won (US$10.4 million) in sales this year, up over 76.4 percent from 6.8 billion won (US$5.9 million) last year. SNS Energy currently maintains 70 operations in eight countries including South Korea, China, Taiwan and Japan.