With the emphasis for on/off valves and the balance for control valves, municipal wastewater plants are projected to spend $4.5 billion for valves in 2017, according to Industrial Valves: World Markets, a report by the McIlvaine Company.
China is projected to be the country leader because of its increase in secondary treatment capacity, which has tripled in the last two decades to over 30,000 MGD. By contrast, other countries in the Americas treat anywhere from 31 percent to 79 percent of the transported sewage.
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There is new construction in smaller cities in Eastern Europe because of the EU Urban Wastewater Treatment Directive. The plant size is smaller in Europe than in the U.S. For example, while France has less than 20 percent of the population of the U.S., it has 19,000 municipal wastewater plants compared to 16,000 in the U.S.
There are 1,900 active projects in the U.S. and Canada that will require significant valve purchases. However, many of the projects are to replace or upgrade existing facilities rather than to add capacity.
