“If you define the problem correctly, you almost have the solution.”
– Steve jobs
Water filtration is an essential function of any cooling tower
operation that provides crucial protection. Without effective water
filtration, cooling solutions would be unable to remove harmful
contaminants that cause corrosion, fouling, and scale.
Because cooling towers are air scrubbers that suck in anything in the
vicinity—including construction materials, leaves, environmental debris
and litter—it’s important to have a robust filtration system capable of
removing larger contaminants. Often, cooling towers also contain areas
where stagnant water collects, creating an environment for bacteria to
grow and biofilms to form, which results in troublesome fouling issues.
Waterborne pathogens, especially Legionella, are a major risk due to
their ability to multiply rapidly.
Due to these risk areas, cooling towers face increased maintenance
costs, stringent environmental regulations related to deploying adequate
water programs, Legionella testing, and bookkeeping, and increased
downtime resulting from corrosion, fouling, and scale.
Advanced water filtration is the most effective solution to reduce particulate contamination.
Cooling Tower Water Treatment Process
Impact of Advanced Water Filtration
Cooling towers provide the perfect environment for bacteria to grow.
While many programs utilize biocides in addition to scale and corrosion
inhibitors to help reduce and control biofilm, a key piece of the puzzle
is still missing. Advanced water filtration provides that missing layer
of protection to minimize corrosion, fouling and scale.
A water quality analysis may be performed to learn the size of
particles present in the water, this will then provide direction as to
where filtration is needed to ease operation and enhance performance
downstream.
Problem areas vary but are typically related to dirty makeup and side
stream water, along with basin sediment build up. Failure to resolve
these problems results in contaminated water reaching the cooling tower
and heat exchanger. Closed loop systems can also benefit from filtration
as these typically have high oxygen rates which increase corrosion.
Regardless
of where in the system you decide to leverage water treatment, advanced
water filtration enables efficient operation and extends the lifecycle
of cooling tower equipment. Ultimately, improved operational efficiency
leads to tangible energy, water, and money savings.
