Small System Arsenic Removal offered by Severn Trent Services and AdEdge Technologies Inc.

Fort Washington, Pa. - December 12, 2002 - Severn Trent Services, a leading supplier of water and wastewater treatment solutions, and AdEdge Technologies Inc., a supplier of specialty adsorbent products for contaminant removal, announced an agreement to provide arsenic removal systems to the potable water treatment market.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) estimates that approximately 13 million people in the U.S. alone routinely drink water containing arsenic at concentrations greater than allowed under recently established government standards.  The EPA's new Arsenic Rule requires treatment for all drinking water and industrial wastewater with arsenic levels greater than 10 parts per billion (ppb), by January 2006.  This represents a dramatic decrease from the current standard of 50 ppb.  Small community water systems serving less than 10,000 people will bear a greater portion of the financial burden resulting from the new arsenic rule.  The EPA estimates that 86% of small community water systems serving less than 3,300 people, and exceeding the 10 ppb limit, will be required to treat their water.  

Severn Trent Services developed the SORB 33* process to reduce arsenic contamination in large municipal and industrial applications, and the technology has been commercially proven to effectively and economically meet new government standards.  Severn Trent's proprietary, NSF Standard 61-approved media will now be used in AdEdge's new line of AD-33* arsenic removal systems and products.  This media will be an integral component of AdEdge's small-community and non-community drinking water systems.   Additionally, AdEdge is uniquely applying this technology into the point-of-use (POU) and point-of-entry (POE) residential marketplace.  "These packaged adsorption systems will be the simplest and most affordable solutions for the thousands of schools, subdivisions, mobile home parks, and other small public water systems needing to comply with the new arsenic standard," states Greg Gilles, Vice President for AdEdge.

Severn Trent Services Vice President of Marketing and Business Development Tom Mills added, "Our agreement with AdEdge affords both companies the opportunity to broaden current product offerings and present the arsenic removal market with a full range of products with proven technology for every flow rate."

About Severn Trent Services
Severn Trent Services, based in Fort Washington, Pa., is a supplier of water and wastewater treatment solutions. The company's broad range of products and services is concentrated around disinfection and filtration technologies, pipeline analysis, rehabilitation and repair services, contract operating services, and state-of-the-art residential metering products.  The company is part of Severn Trent Plc., Birmingham, England.

About AdEdge Technologies
AdEdge Technologies, based in Atlanta, Ga., is a marketing and technical services company supplying specialty adsorbents, integrated systems and other products for the removal of contaminants from process or aqueous streams within drinking water, environmental remediation, chemical, wastewater and pharmaceutical applications.