New Protective Measures for Cooling Systems

Cooling water treatments have been updated and improved during the last few years. Particularly important are the nontoxic programs which conform plant cooling water effluents to local water quality standards without expenditures for capital equipment. The relationship between scaling and corrosion in natural waters has been recognized for many years. This relationship is the basis for the Langelier Saturation Index control method which was once widely applied to reduce corrosion in cooling water systems. It used solubility characteristics to maintain a very thin deposit on metal surfaces for preventing corrosion. This technique was rarely successful. That is, the solubility of calcium carbonate and most other inorganic salts depends on temperature. If good control exists on cold surfaces, excessive deposition results on the heat transfer tubes. Also, because water characteristic normally vary in a typical cooling system, precise control of scaling at both hot and cold surfaces is virtually impossible