Velocity effect on electronic-antifouling technology to mitigate mineral fouling in enhanced-tube heat exchanger

The purpose of the present study was to investigate the effect of flow velocity on an electronic-antifouling (EAF) treatment, which was considered to mitigate mineral fouling in a heat exchanger with cooling-tower water. Nine different tests were conducted with no-blowdown: six runs with an in-line EAF treatment and three runs with the EAF treatment at a side-stream loop. The flow velocities tested were 0.6, 1.2, 1.5 and 2.0 m/s. As the flow velocity was increased, the benefit of the in-line EAF treatment decreased. At a flow velocity of 0.6 m/s, the fouling resistance decreased by 80% in the case with the EAF treatment compared with that in the no-treatment case for both in-line and side-stream EAF treatments.