Posted by William Vander Plaats on Wed, Oct 21, 2009 @ 04:00 PM
Cooling towers for large buildings and plants are often magnets for dirt and other airborne particles. This is especially true if they are located near open fields, airports, or other things that raise the level of airborne debris. Contamination in tower basins can also be caused by large amounts of precipitated minerals from water treatment (calcium carbonate) or non-chemical water treatment.
The accumulation of this dirt and other solids will result in:
- Reduced efficiencies for all the system components
- Increased maintenance costs, since manual cleaning of the basin will be required from time to time
- Increased water usage, since occasional backwashings will be required
- Increased chemical water treatment costs, since the chemicals will not react as efficiently with non-filtered water as they will with FILTERED water. More chemicals will be needed if the water is not filtered.
A very effective method to prevent this accumulation of dirt is twofold: first to
- use strategically placed nozzles under pressure to keep the dirt from settling in one place and direct the dirt toward the inlet of a
- separator or other filtration device such as a sand media filter to remove the dirt and unwanted solids.
A short video showing how this is accomplished using LAKOS products is available on YouTube. Cooling towers can be custom built or purchased from a major manufacturer, and common basin layouts are available for those common sizes.
Deaconess Hospital in Oklahoma City (Case Study AB-209) saved 60 man hours per year AND reduced employee liability and water usage by installing such a system. They kept their heat exchangers and chillers clean and running at maximum efficiency using this system. This also helps in Legionella prevention as well, a special concern for hospitals.
Saint John's Hospital in Indiana (Case Study AB-208) experienced the same results with their system, consisting of a closed loop system and two chillers. Similar results have been found by many other cooling tower owners.
Have you ever tried to clean a cooling tower basin by hand?