Amarinth delivers innovative variable speed pumps for Sonatrac

Algerian fuel manufacturing company, Sonatrac, has commissioned two new Axsia Nutshell Filters at its Birbirkine site in Algeria. These are the first Axsia filters to incorporate an ingenious new variable speed pump designed by Amarinth. Axsia, a subsidia

Amarinth delivers innovative variable speed pumps into Axsia Nutshell Filters for Sonatrac

Algerian fuel manufacturing company, Sonatrac, has commissioned two new Axsia Nutshell Filters at its Birbirkine site in Algeria. These are the first Axsia filters to incorporate an ingenious new variable speed pump designed by Amarinth.

Axsia, a subsidiary of the NATCO Group, supplies the European market with the NATCO PowerClean system. Nutshell filters are an extremely efficient way of treating oily water produced during the processing of oil and gas. The success of the filter however relies heavily on the design and operation of the pump to circulate the nutshell fibrous media without damaging it during the backwash process.

In order to support its European market, Axsia required a local pump partner and selected Amarinth to produce a pump system for this challenging task. Amarinth designed an elegant, compact and reliable variable speed pump system by modifying one of its proven heavy duty pumps to suit the specific operating conditions. Materials were chosen that could survive in a sour service environment containing hydrogen sulphide.


Pump speed is crucial to the process of releasing the oil effectively. A change of just 100rpm makes a significant difference. Amarinth chose to use its innovative variable speed control system to govern the pump speed. This produced a compact and uncomplicated system where the optimum speed can be easily selected. The result is a significant decrease in overall commissioning and process optimisation time over traditional complex belt drive systems.

Mr Andrew Hamilton, Proposals Manager at Axsia commented: “Finding a reliable and supportive supplier for the recirculator pumps was the key to producing the Nutshell Filters here in the UK. Amarinth listened to our requirements and came up some great ideas. They worked closely with us to create a very elegant solution.”

Oliver Brigginshaw, Managing Director of Amarinth, added: “We are delighted that the new pump system has delivered the benefits Axsia were seeking. We pride ourselves on delivering innovative solutions to challenging design problems. For the Nutshell Filters we brought together a number of our proven technologies to deliver an improved, cost effective and reliable solution.”

The ongoing partnership between Axsia and Amarinth will see a range of material options being offered and a standardised range of pumps of each size of filter. Customised installations have already been designed and supplied, such as horizontal pumps for the Prirazlomnoye offshore oilfield located in northern Russia.

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