Novo Nordisk has begun a live pilot at its Hillerød, Denmark facility, using reverse-osmosis membranes installed by the Technical University of Denmark to test whether pharmaceutical production wastewater can be cleaned to a grade suitable for re-entering injectable drug manufacturing. The Danish pharma manufacturer estimates a 50% cut in process-water consumption if the project clears the Danish Medicines Agency's documentation bar interestingengineering.com. On a day otherwise light on contract awards, the single most consequential water-treatment development was this industrial reuse trial and the regulatory evidence it is meant to generate Mirage News.
Key Takeaways
- Novo Nordisk and DTU are running a membrane-based water-reuse pilot at the Hillerød facility, installed in December 2025, targeting a 50% cut in pharmaceutical process-water consumption.
- Reverse osmosis is the core separation step; the project is the first attempt to route treated production wastewater back into injectable-drug manufacture rather than cooling-tower duty.
- The Danish Academy of Technical Sciences reports Danish pharma water use rose 35.8% between 2012 and 2022, even as total industrial water use was flat.
- Documented water quality will be filed with the Danish Medicines Agency as part of patient-safety and product-quality risk assessments.
New Builds, Upgrades & Capacity Expansion
Novo Nordisk–DTU wastewater reuse pilot, Hillerød, Denmark
Novo Nordisk is working with DTU researchers to test whether process wastewater from pharmaceutical production can be purified well enough to re-enter manufacturing, especially for injectable medicines where water quality standards are strictest. The pilot uses reverse-osmosis membranes installed at the Hillerød site in December 2025 by DTU researcher Ravi Kumar Chhetri interestingengineering.com. Today the company recycles only a portion of its process water, and only in cooling towers where the water ultimately evaporates; the new test is aimed at closed-loop reuse in the production stream itself Mirage News. Environmental Lead Andreas Herfelt said the company estimates a 50% reduction in water consumption if the recycled water proves acceptable. Professor Anders Baun is supporting the risk-analysis work that will determine whether trace substances remaining after membrane treatment pose any patient-safety concern. The data package will be submitted to the Danish Medicines Agency as documentation that reuse does not compromise product quality or patient safety.
Specification Read — Pharmaceutical Process-Water Reuse
A 50% reuse claim from a single site translates into a meaningful swing in raw-water demand: for a pharma plant drawing on the order of 1,000–5,000 m³/day of purified water, a 50% offset removes 500–2,500 m³/day of intake, a number that scales directly with injectable-line throughput. The pilot's treatment train is a classic high-recovery sequence: pre-filtration to protect the membrane, then reverse osmosis as the primary separation, followed by continuous analytical monitoring to detect organic trace residues, with final polishing (typically EDI or a second-pass RO) to reach Water for Injection (WFI) or Purified Water grades. The bottleneck is not permeate flow but trace organics and endotoxin carry-through, which is why the DTU risk analyses focus on what survives the membrane rather than on throughput. If your plant runs 500–3,000 m³/day of process water, injectables, and is under pressure to reduce both intake and discharge load, a closed-loop MBR-plus-RO train is the configuration this trial is meant to validate, and the documentation set coming out of Hillerød will set the regulatory bar for the next wave of pharma reuse projects.
FAQ
What does a 5,000 m³/day pharmaceutical reuse plant cost to build?
A packaged 5,000 m³/day MBR plus two-pass RO system sized for pharma-grade reuse typically falls in a general engineering range of USD 4–8 million for equipment, with civil works and validation running additional. Final price depends on feedwater quality, target WFI or Purified Water grade, and the documentation package required by the local medicines agency interestingengineering.com.
What BOD and COD reduction can a DAF stage deliver upstream of an MBR?
A well-operated DAF unit ahead of biological treatment commonly removes 60–80% of suspended solids and 30–50% of BOD, dropping influent BOD from 800–1,500 mg/L down to 400–900 mg/L before the biological stage. Actual performance depends on coagulant and flocculant dose, hydraulic loading, and surfactant load typical of pharmaceutical effluent.
How long is the lead time on a containerised RO system for a pharma plant?
Standard containerised RO skids ship in 10–16 weeks from purchase order, with site installation and commissioning adding another 4–8 weeks. Lead times stretch when the unit must meet WFI-grade documentation, full GMP validation, and a medicines-agency audit file, which is the track the Novo Nordisk–DTU pilot is building evidence for Mirage News.
