Cooling Tower Water Treatment Solutions

A cooling tower water treatment system is required for industrial companies using cooling tower systems for their facility. The proper water treatment system in the towers ensures an efficient process of cooling and long-lasting life of the equipment.

When the water treatment is not being taken care of, it gives way for organic growth, fouling, scaling, and corrosion to grow. These contaminants are responsible for reduced plant productivity, causing plant downtime, which eventually requires costly equipment replacements.

But what exactly is cooling tower water treatment, and how does it work?

Cooling tower water treatment system

An arrangement of technologies to remove damaging impurities from the cooling tower's feed water, circulation, and blowdown are called a cooling tower water treatment system. The particular arrangement is carried out for your system that will depend on several things, which include the following:

• Quality of the feed water of your cooling tower system

• The type of cooling tower you have among the common open circulating, once-through, or closed-loop

• Cycle of concentration

• Type of heat-exchanger

• The recommended quality requirements for cooling towers and equipment by your specific manufacturer

• Regulatory requirements for discharge

• Chemistry and makeup of your circulatory water

• If blowdown should be treated for reuse in the cooling tower

What does an entire cooling tower water treatment system include?

Cooling tower water treatment system typically has some type of:

• Automated monitoring

• Chemical feed

• Filtration and ultrafiltration

• Ion exchange/softening

• Clarification

Any combination of these treatments can best suit your facility; choosing the combination will most likely depend on the impurities present in your water. Thus, you will need to consult with your water treatment specialist to determine the right system for your specific cooling tower. These are standard components that are usually adequate for your cooling towers and process depending on your needs. You might need to add on some technologies if your tower requires a system that has more customization to do.

Cooling tower water treatment system typically controls

Technologies in the cooling tower water system are necessary to regulate the level of the following components:

• Silica: it is known for causing hard scale deposits

• Alkalinity: it will control the potential of the calcium carbonate scale

• Sulfates: they can be highly corrosive to metals

• Chlorides: just like sulfates, they can be corrosive to metals too, they can tolerate different levels on the basis of materials of cooling towers and equipment

• Total dissolved solids (TDS): they contribute to foaming, scaling, and corrosion

• Organic matter: organic matter promotes microorganism growth which can result in fouling, corrosion, and other system issues

• Hardness: the hardness puts up with the scale on heat exchangers and in the cooling tower

Let us dive into understanding how a cooling tower water treatment system work.

The water treatment system arrangements vary depending on the quality/chemistry of the feed requirements of the cooling tower.

In general, a cooling tower treatment system usually includes the following steps:

Cooling tower makeup water intake

Makeup water from the cooling tower is first drawn from its source; the water could be raw, city water, city-treated effluent, in-plant wastewater recycle, well water, or any other surface water source. You may or may not need treatment depending on the quality of this water. Suppose a water treatment system happens to be required at this part of the cooling tower water process. In that case, it usually becomes the technology that removes hardness and silica or balances and adjusts the pH. The proper treatment revamps the tower evaporation cycles and minimizes the water bleed rate at this point of the process. After reducing the water bleed rate, it takes place to drain the stuff that might be done with chemicals alone.

Filtration and infiltration

Then comes operating the cooling tower water through some filtration for the removal of any suspended particles. These particles and contaminants usually include sediment, turbidity, and certain types of organic matter. This step is typically helpful early on in the process, as the removal of suspended solids upstream has the ability to help protect membranes and ion exchange resins from fouling later on in the pretreatment process.

Ion exchange/water softening

If the level of hardness in your source/makeup water is high, there might be a need to remove the hardness. In this step, a softening resin is used wherein a resin is charged with a sodium ion. Gradually the hardness penetrates; as this happens, it will have a higher affinity for calcium, magnesium, and iron, so it is likely to grab that molecule and release the sodium molecule into the water. If these contaminants are left behind, they can cause scale deposits and rust.

Chemical addition

During the process in this step, there comes the usage of chemicals in the process. Chemicals like corrosion inhibitors, algaecides, and biocide, scale inhibitors are added. A detailed treatment before this stage can help reduce the number of chemicals needed to treat water at this point in the process.

Side-stream filtration

Side-stream filtration usually helps in removing any difficult contaminants that have entered past the drift contamination or leak. As per the criteria, about 10% of the circulating water will filter through if your cooling tower water system will require side-stream filtration.

Blowdown treatment

The last step of the process is blowdown or bleed from the water. You will need to meet all regulatory requirements if the water from your blowdown needs to be discharged.

Conclusion

Tower tech is one of the leading cooling tower manufacturers in the country; we are best known for industry-standard cooling towers. Get in touch with us for the best solutions to your cooling tower problems.