The water treatment program is a key facet in maintaining the cooling system at 100% efficiency. There is no replacement for the service, knowledge or expertise required to maintain the water treatment program, but only new tools to assist in making the process easier. The ED 2000 is one of those tools.
There are several goals of water treatment --- scale control, corrosion control, control of biological fouling and the economics of water use. Changes in water quality, field operators or other unforeseen events require constant monitoring of the water treatment program to insure that the balance of treatment chemicals are maintained to match the quality of the make-up water at an identified cycle of concentration. There is a very small margin of error.
The ED 2000 assists in one facet of this program….scale control. The ED 2000 Anti-Fouling System allows for an increased margin of error in maintaining quality condenser water, thus mitigating the risk of failure. If there is a fluctuation in water quality, the bleed is not properly maintained for a short period or there is a shortage of personnel to perform the monthly maintenance checks, the chances of failure with ED 2000 installed are greatly reduced.
The ED 2000 assists in one facet of this program….scale control.
The ED 2000 System is designed to enhance a chemical-based cooling water treatment program. When designing and implementing a cooling treatment program, the following items must be considered:
Scale Control: ED 2000 is used much like a cooling water inhibitor program in that it causes crystal distortion of the calcium and magnesium ions in the cooling water making them non-adherent to heat transfer surfaces. A chemical treatment program using phosphonates, such as ATMP and HEDP, is very similar. The difference is the ED 2000 causes nucleation of the distorted crystals and uses filtration to remove them. The chemical program uses a dispersant to retard crystal growth and disperse it throughout the system for removal through the tower bleed.
Filtration, a very important component to assisting in this process will be discussed further in the fouling control section.
If the current filtration is less than 5% of the recirculation rate or greater than 15 microns, the cycles of concentration must be decreased to compensate for the reduced filtration rate. In this case, the cycles of concentration should be reduced or the filtration rate increased.
Corrosion Control:
Monomolecular calcium
carbonate is an effective corrosion inhibitor. This is a prevalent corrosion
inhibitor in alkaline chemistry programs and the key to mitigating corrosion
using ED 2000. The cooling water treatment program treated with ED 2000 can be
run on the alkaline side and corrosion will be controlled. An oxidizing biocide
will stimulate corrosion to both ferrous and copper-based alloys, therefore a
non-oxidizing biocide program should be considered. It is recommended that
corrosion coupons should be utilized to track the corrosion trends and allow for
monitoring and adjustments to the program.