French firm to design Shanghai wetland to clean factory water

French wastewater treatment company Suez said Tuesday it had been awarded a contract to design an artificial wetland to clean water from a petrochemical industrial zone outside Shanghai.

Suez said the 36-hectare "dragonfly zone" will use "the treatment capabilities of the natural environment" to remove micropollutants from water after its discharge from a standard facility that it operates at the Shanghai Chemical Industrial Park.

The industrial park, located on Hangzhou Bay to the south of Shanghai, is one of the largest petrochemical industrial sites in Asia and hosts facilities of a number of foreign companies as well as Chinese firms.

Suez says its dragonfly zone concept uses the purification capacities of aquatic eco-systems that are created using locally selected plants to improve the chemical and bacteriological quality of water as it moves through the various pools.

Renovation of 13 hectares of existing wetlands and adding another 23 hectares will require an estimated 18.5 million euros ($19.7 million).

Suez first tested the technology at a site in southern France in 2009.