industry water treatment founded 1939 headquarters rueil malmaison france key people r mi lantier ceo ; jacques blein coo revenue 1.520 billion number of employees 4 600 subsidiaries ameriwater aquasource innoplana triogen anderson infilco ozonia wpt website www.degremont.com degr mont is a company specializing in the production of drinking water 1 and in the treatment of sewage and sludge . after starting as a family business in france in 1939 it has since become a subsidiary of suez environment employing 4 600 people in 70 countries and generating annual revenues of 1.520 billion 2010 figures . contents 1 history 2 drinking water 3 sewage and sludge treatment 4 activities 5 company culture 6 r & d 7 references 8 external links history edit founded by gilbert degr mont in 1939 on the outskirts of paris as a follow up of his father emille degr mont s water treatment company established 1904 at le cateau cambr sis the degr mont company soon entered the international market with contracts in countries such as egypt iran indonesia and peru . in 1972 the company merged with sgea to become lyonnaise des eaux which later became part of the suez group . today it is a subsidiary of suez environment 1 2 and has operations worldwide . gilbert degr mont s grandfather adalbert had already set up a mechanical engineering plant in the north of france in 1870 which was converted by his son emile into a water treatment business . after completing an engineering degree in agronomics gilbert launched the degr mont company that is still in existence today . drinking water edit degr mont is involved in the production of drinking water from groundwater or surface water in industrialized countries and the developing world . its activities also include the desalination of seawater or brackish water for use as either drinking water or in irrigation . in all cases the water it produces is expected to meet the regulatory standards in operation in the relevant country . degr mont has built 3 000 plants drinking water treatment plants around the world and 250 desalination plants . to produce drinking water it uses a range of different technologies such as settling flottation media filters membrane ultrafiltration ozone purification or ultraviolet disinfection systems . its desalination plants use the reverse osmosis technology . sewage and sludge treatment edit the company is also involved in the treatment of sewage and sludge which is a growing problem for urban areas in particular . it relies on a range of different technologies including physical chemical or biological treatments ozonization membrane bioreactors sand filters etc. most wastewater is treated for use in irrigation or for use in industrial cooling systems . degr mont has built 2 500 sewage treatment plants with the capacity to recycle 2.4 million cubic meters per day . sludge treatment is focused first on reducing the volumes of sludge produced and second processing it for reuse mainly in agriculture . this is done through digestion incineration thickening dewatering or drying all of which can also lead to biogas recovery for use in energy production . activities edit degr mont estimates that 1 billion people 1 are served by its 10 000 facilities around the world . these include 3 000 drinking water plants and 2 500 water treatment stations for urban wastewater . it carries out its activities using a number of different business models . it designs finances and builds facilities for the production of drinking water and for the treatment and recycling of sewage and sludge . this includes desalination plants that notably use reverse osmosis technology to create drinking water from seawater . it can also operate those facilities for its customers in the public or private sector when contracted to do so . under its build operate transfer contracts degr mont is responsible for financing and running facilities during the contract period up to 25 years . ownership is then transferred to the customer . it sells equipment to facilities owned or run by third parties . company culture edit since 1951 degr mont has published the water treatment handbook a book containing the company s combined knowledge of water chemistry and water treatment . there have been 10 french editions and 7 english editions lavoisier and it has been published in 10 languages in total . the company encourages its managers to participate in numerous international conferences and congresses where they share degr mont technologies . degr mont has obtained goodcorporation certification a responsible business practice assessment system looking at the way an organisation is managed in relation to its employees its customers its suppliers its shareholders the environment and even its contribution to the community . r & d edit degr mont spent 13.5 million on r & d in 2010 and has filed over 500 patents 1 since its creation . recent investments have focused on improving the energy performance of plants and ultrafiltration membranes . references edit a b c d http degremont.com document f groupe en degremont ra 2008 2009 en.pdf http investing.businessweek.com research stocks private snapshot.asp privcapid 20970096 external links edit www.degremont.com retrieved from https en.wikipedia.org w index.php title degr mont & oldid 733031397 categories water companies of franceengie navigation menu personal tools not logged intalkcontributionscreate accountlog in namespaces article talk variants views read edit view history more search navigation main pagecontentsfeatured contentcurrent eventsrandom articledonate to wikipediawikipedia store interaction helpabout wikipediacommunity portalrecent changescontact page tools what links hererelated changesupload filespecial pagespermanent linkpage informationwikidata itemcite this page print export create a bookdownload as pdfprintable version languages fran ais edit links this page was last modified on 4 august 2016 at 22 19 . text is available under the creative commons attribution sharealike license ; additional terms may apply . by using this site you agree to the terms of use and privacy policy . wikipedia is a registered trademark of the wikimedia foundation inc. a non profit organization . privacy policy about wikipedia disclaimers contact wikipedia developers cookie statement mobile view