Why Proper Water Treatment Is The Lifeline Of Cooling Towers?

Large industries such as petrochemicals, oil refineries, commercial buildings and thermal power stations use cooling towers in their provision. In cooling towers, cooling is executed using evaporation which ushers to leftover water being condensed. If you fail to look after the water for a long time, then the biological growth, chemical residue, sludge and corrosion can make a mess of the performance of the cooling tower.

Not performing water treatment will severely affect the cooling tower components, which would ultimately demolish the equipment. Thus, that is why cooling tower treatment is necessary to make sure the process remains smooth and works for the long term.

The water treatment solution plays an essential role in the process optimization by effectively decreasing the draining of water, separating minerals like zinc, carbonate and chromates from the water while managing the growth of micro-organisms.

When applied, the water treatment to a proper cooling tower be it a fanless cooling tower or other, steers to decreased scaling and eliminates biological corrosion, fouling and boosting the plant’s lifespan without injuring the environment.

Cooling Tower Water Treatment System:

Cooling tower water treatment systems are created to unfasten impurities from cooling towers intake water, circulation water and blowdown. The general cooling tower water treatment includes clarification, softening, filtration, chemical feed and automated monitoring.

The system works with the amalgamation of adsorption, turbulence and galvanic action while subduing the scale built up in the cooling tower, pipeline and heat exchange.

How Does the Cooling Tower Water Treatment System Work?

The cooling tower water treatment system is based on the chemistry of the feed and water circulation. But, a general water treatment includes the given steps:

• Ion Exchange/Water Softening

If there is any hardness in your source, then your cooling tower might need water treatment. A softening resin can be used. It’s a robust acid cation exchange process, which is charged with sodium ion and when hardness takes place, it will grab the molecule and release the sodium molecule into the water.

It unfastens the source or makeup water’s hardness, which often leads to scale deposition and rusting.

• Filtration and Ultrafiltration

It carries running the cooling towers through a filtration system, which removes particles like sediment, turbidity and certain other types of organic matters. Often is useful in the early process, as the removal of suspended solids upstream can help secure membranes and ion exchange resins from fouling after in the pre-treatment process.

• Side-stream Filtration

If cooling tower water is to be recirculated in the system, then a side-stream filtration unit will be needed in order to remove the impurities. The contaminants that have entered the system via a leak or drift contamination. If your cooling tower water treatment system needs side-stream filtration, about 10% of the water will filter across. It usually carries a good quality multimedia filtration unit.

• Blowdown Treatment

Lastly, the cooling tower treatment thoroughly removes the liquid and solid waste from the tower. Allowing to treat water to be reused. Depending on how much water the cooling tower wants to circulate for proper cooling capacity, the plants will choose to recycle and recover the water via post-treatment in ion-exchange or RO. Especially in places where water might be in short supply. Thus, allowing liquid to be concentrated and removed while treated water can go back to the tower and be reused.

If the water from your blowdown requires releasing any waste, it should need to meet all regulatory requirements. Thus, there the sewer connection might cost you higher fees in the places where water is scant. Plus, your cooling tower’s discharge must meet local municipal discharge regulations if your discharge is returned to the environment.

Final thoughts,

Global water treatment systems for cooling towers mainly comprise a combination of water softening, physical water filtration and chemical water treatment by the cooling tower suppliers. Softening and physical water filtration are needed to discard damaging mineral deposits and particulates while chemical water treatments like biocides and algaecides toil to prevent microbiological growths.

A proper water treatment system can help to decrease maintenance costs while lowering water consumption and energy costs. As a result, when you are using high quality makeup water, facilities can reduce the amount of blowdown or cooling tower bleed.