SOURCES OF WATER

Sources of water

Surface water Rain water Underground water Sea water

Springs Tube wells Wells

Flowing Still water
water

Lakes Reservoirs Ponds

In India most of the power plants use River Water.

 Hardness of Water

‘Prevents the lathering of soap’

Reasons: Presence of certain salts of Ca, Mg and other heavy metal

ions like Al3+, Fe3+ and Mn2+ dissolved in water.

2C17H35COONa + CaCl2 (C17H35COO)2Ca + 2NaCl

2C17H35COONa + MgSO4 (C17H35COO)2Mg + Na2SO4

 Types of Hardness:
Temporary Hardness:

Salts responsible: Ca(HCO3)2, Mg(HCO3)2 and carbonate of Iron.

Largely removed by boiling of water.

Ca(HCO3)2 ∆ CaCO3 + H2O + CO2

Mg(HCO3)2 ∆ Mg(OH)2 + 2CO2

Permanent Hardness:

Salts responsible: CaCl2, MgCl2, CaSO4, MgSO4, FeSO4, Al2(SO4)3

 BOILER FEED WATER
A boiler – feed water should correspond with the following composition:

(i) Its hardness should be below 0.2 ppm

(ii) Its caustic alkalinity (due to OH–) should lie in between 0.15 and
0.45 ppm.

(iii) Its soda alkalinity (due to Na2CO3) should be 0.45 – 1 ppm.

Excess of impurities, in boiler feed water cause following problems.

1. Scale & sludge 2. Priming 3. Foaming

4. Carryover 5. Boiler Corrosion 6. Caustic embrittlerment
 WATER TREATMENT PLANT

The impurities present in river water can be broadly classified into following
groups :

● Floating solids
● Suspended solids
● Colloids
● Dissolved solids
● Dissolved liquids, gases etc.

For thermal power station the most objectionable impurities are dissolved
solids
 PRE-TREATMENT PLANT

Depending upon the impurities present in source water pre-treatment plants are
designed.
Normally following processes are carried out in pretreatment plant

■ Screening
■ Storage of raw water
■ Aeration
■ Chlorination
■ Coagulation and flocculation
■ Filtration
 Raw water to Clarified water

Raw water bay

RW make up pumps

Clarifi Clariflocculator Cl2 dosing

ed
water
Lime dosing

Alum dosing
Flash
mixer

12/8/21 PMI Revision 00 7

 SCREENING

Coarse screens are provided at river intake to prevent floating material of fairly
large size entering the works.

The steel bar forming the screen are normally quite substantial (about 25 mm
dia.) and are spaced about 100 mm apart.

The velocity of water through the screen openings should not exceed 0.5 m/s

Fine screens are also normally fitted immediately after the coarse screens, the
orifices of which are generally of the order of 6 mm.
 RAW WATER STORAGE

The storage provided is for 7- 15 days of the average water demand.

This is sufficient of to reduce pathogenic bacteria, suspended solids

and river algae, while at the same time not long enough to encourage
other organism to develop.
 PRE CHLORINATION

Chlorine is injected into the raw water soon after it enters the plant.

Dosing rate : 2- 5 mg/L

This destroys the high bacterial count, but also oxidises and precipitates
iron and manganise, kills algae, reduce color and slime formation are
generally assists settlement.
Chlorination
 AERATION

It is a cheap and valuable means of controlling taste, odor and corrosion

Gases are absorbed or liberated from water until equilibrium is reached

between the natural content of each gas in the atmosphere and its content in
the water.

* If water is lacking in dissolved oxygen, it will pickup

oxygen from air.
* Looses excess CO2 or H2S
* Iron and manganese in solution are oxidized and
precipitated out
* Certain volatile substance is liberated by algae growths or
decomposition of organic matter, can be released from water
Aeration
 COAGULATION

Coagulation is a process by which small particles in suspension join

together to form large agglomerate.

Fine suspended particles and colloids present in water carry charges on their
surface and most of the common materials assume negative charge.

Obvious way of promoting coagulation is to neutralize or reverse the

electrical repulsion effect. In that case, the particles will touch each other or
pulled together and agglomerate. This can be done by two ways.

(i) By adding traces of surface- active materials called coagulation aids.

(ii) By introducing fresh particles with positive charge.
 COAGULATION AIDS

Long chain molecule carrying electrically active groups all along the length of
the chain.

For- example: long chain poly - acryl amides, which carries

positive charge.

Most of the very effective aids (poly- acryl amides) are toxic and can not
be used in potable water.

A common nontoxic aid is activated silica.

It is prepared on the site because it is unstable & requirement may be more than
ten times than that of poly acryl amides.
 FLOCCULATION

Ferric and aluminium salts when added in water forms insoluble hydroxides,
which come out as floppy flocs, whose surface carry positive charge. This
positive charge flocs attaches itself with the negative charge particles in water.

More effective; because

■ Large electropositive surface area

■ Greatly increases particle concentration in water, which
increases, the probability of collision, proper pH, good mixing time and
presence of nuclei on which precipitate can form, favors good floc
formation.
Aluminium and iron hydroxide gives good flocs normally in slight acidic pH

Iron : 5 – 6 pH
Aluminium: 6 – 7 pH

When alum (Aluminium sulphate) is added in water aluminium hydroxide floc

and sulphuric acid is formed.

Al2(SO4)3 + 6 H2O → Al(OH)3 ↓ + 3 H2SO4

If turbidity is high alum dosing is also high

Here pH may fall below the coagulation pH

Lime [Ca(OH)2] is generally used to increase pH and it is also have coagulation

property.
Coagulation and flocculation
 CLARIFIERS

Clarifiers are structure/system in which water is cleared from most of the

suspended solids with or without addition of coagulant.

There are different types of clarifiers:

● Conventional Type Clarifiers.

● Solid Contact Unit Clarifier
(i) Slurry re-circulation clarifier
(ii) Sludge blanket clarifier

● Hopper Bottom Clarifier

Latest concept. The tank is usually square in plane with upper portion having
vertical sides and the lower portion in the form of an inverted pyramid with
sides at an angle of 60°to the horizontal size of the tank is governed by the
turbidity and volume of the feed water.
 CONTROL OF FLOCCULATION

A variable velocity valve adjustable from the top of the tank is fitted with inlet
pipe to take care exceptional changes of water characteristics or wide variation
of flow.

Inlet pipe has a fixed diameter outlet to give required discharge velocity.

The effect of increases flow through the tank is the expansion of the sludge
blanket until the equilibrium is re-established. The surface of the sludge blanket
will rise but carry over will not occur until the increase in flow is excessive.
 COLLECTION OF CLARIFIED WATER

The water coming out of the sludge blanket passes up through straight position
of the tank and is drawn off by a series of collecting troughs.
They have notched side and are provided with adjustable support to enable
them to be set for uniform draw off. This eliminates chances of short-
circuiting.

SLUDGE DISCHARGE

It is necessary to bleed off a small flow of sludge through concentrating pocket.

It may be constructed in the concrete or it may be suspended from the top of
the tank.

The main discharge pipe is periodically used to remove heavier sludge from the
bottom of the tank.
 Clarified water to Filtered water

Clarified water Sand filters

FW DW
sump sump

Clari-flocculator
Post-chlorination
Cl2

Cl2 House FW DW
pumps pumps

Filtered water

DM water To Township for

for Plant DM PLANT drinking water
purpose PMI Revision 00 22
 SPECIFICATION OF CLARIFIED WATER

The clarified water should be seen by naked eye without any turbidity.

Almost 98% turbidity should be removed.

FILTRATION
Filtration means taking suspended solids out of fluids
There are some problems :

(i) Suspended matter and water is relatively viscous. This means that very small
holes must be used and any reasonable rate of flow, through them will
raise a high- pressure loss.
(ii) As the filtration process is in progress, the suspended matter slowly blinds
the pores of the Screen resulting greater pressure loss and slowly stoppage of
the process. Deposition of suspended matter on the pores of the screen is
known as formation of filter cake.
 There are two kinds of simple screen filter

(a) True screens, such as meshes, sieves, sinters, felts, fibrewound

candles or cloth held in some device which forces water to flow
through.
(b) Disposable screens which are created a fresh for every filter
cycle. This class includes paper filters and cartridge filter which are
used at place where there is used little suspended matter to remove, else
filter replacement becomes too costly.

MICRO STRAINERS
Cylindrical drum covered with a very fine wire mesh.

Raw water flows into the middle of the drum and out through the mesh by
gravity. The drum rotates continuously and bring the mesh under a high
pressure jet.
 DEEP BED FILTER

This is a vessel in which filter bed is created from a fine granular medium
such as sand etc. through which water is made to flow.

The suspended matter gets caught in the discontinuities which occur within
such a bed. When the bed accumulates lot of solids that is practicable, the
flow of water practically stops and the bed is back washed for reviving the
filtering capacity.
The deep bed filter differ from another filters:

(a) They are capable of filtering very fine solids including colloids.

(b) Fine sand gives finer filtration because the size of the channel is
decreased and a more area of filtration is achieved.

(c) Particles tend to accumulate at the same place, promotes

coagulation.
(d) Depending the bed increases the availability of the filter
medium and improves the quality of filtrate.
(e) At the end of a filter cycle, the rising pressure loss can force
accumulated dirt right through the filter.
 RAPID SAND FILTER

It consists of a bed of grinded sand typically +30 mesh to 15 mesh about

0.6 meter in depth. This lies in a bed of grinded gravel in several layers.

The gravel sizes vary from 2.5 mm to 25 mm. This filter operates between
5 – 10 m3/m2/hr. and capable of removing particles up to 10 micron size
from water containing 100 ppm of suspended load.
 ACTIVATED CARBON FILTER: (AC FILTER)

Granular carbon is used as a filter.

The water, as it progressively looses its pollutants encounters zones of

activated carbon which are less and less saturated and therefore more and
more active.
 LIMITATIONS
(a) Filtration:

This must often be reduced to minimum in order to avoid clogging of the

bed. Carbon tend to exert absorbable products from the flow with which it
is contact, causing premature saturation.

(b) Biological media:

The surface of carbon offers ideal conditions bacterial growth. This

phenomenon does assist purification but can also be very dangerous if not
properly controlled.

Anaerobic fermentation giving off odor, clogging of bed etc.

(c) Catalytic action:

The main function of activated carbon is oxidation of water by free chlorine.

Cl2 + H2O → 2HCl + ½ O2

The pH has considerable role to play. The de-chlorination properly is

affected by any factor that interfaces between carbon and chlorine such as
filterable impurities like flock, algae etc.
Thus a clean water perform better for activated carbon filter.

Absorption:

This is the principle role of the activated carbon. A grate care is taken to
keep the bed active and unaffected.
 MEMBRANE FILTERS

Organic membranes have very fine pores.

‘Ultra filtration’ membranes have pores small enough to remove most kind of
non reactive silica with a pressure across the membrane less than 5 bars.

● Installed after DM plant to absorb colloidal silica.

● Reverse osmosis plant followed by DM plant can produce

water of almost ultimate purity and is very economical in handling
brackish salts or more than 500 ppm.
 D.M. PLANT

Dissolved solids present in water are removed in DM plant by ION

exchange process and for this ION exchange resins are used.

ION EXCHANGE RESINS

ION Exchange resins are Synthetic polymers

Most commonly used resins are gel type polystyrene resin, manufactured by
polymerization of Vinyl Benzene (Styrene) and 8- 10% Divinyl Benzene.
DM Plant
Ion exchange resin are manufactured in bead form (0.3 mm or 1.2 mm size)
optimum size 0.6 mm. Smaller size would restrict the flow and higher size,
retention time would not be sufficient for proper exchange.

Resin Beads are insoluble in water. Functional groups are then attached to each
of the benzene rings to make it chemically active.

Depending upon the functional group attached to resin Matrix, it behaves as cation
exchange resin or anion exchange resin.
 CATION EXCHANGE RESIN

Cation exchange resins are nothing but acid and can be represented as: R–
H+, where R is resin matrix completely insoluble in water and only H+ is
mobile in water.
Cation exchange resins are of two types.

Strong acid cation exchange resins (SAC) :

When the functional group attached to resin matrix is strong acid group.
SAC can split all salts and its performance is not influenced by pH of water.

Operational exchange capacity and regeneration efficiency of SAC is less

than WAC.
 Weak Acid Cation Exchange Resin

When the attached functional group is of weak acid, it is called WAC resin.

WAC can only split weak electrolyte (carbonate and bicarbonate) only.
It performs better with high pH water and with lower pH water its performance
decreases.
When pH < 4, actually regeneration takes place.

Na2CO3 H2CO3 H2CO3

NaCl WAC SAC
NaCl HCl

Na2CO3
SAC H2CO3
NaCl
HCl
 ANION EXCHANGE RESINS

Anion exchange resins can be simply represented as R+– OH– and is nothing
but an alkali / base. OH– is only mobile in water.

Anion Exchange Resins are of two types:

Strong Base Anion Resins (SBA):
Functional group is strong base; performance is not influenced by water pH
& it exchanges with both strong & weak acid.

Weak Base Anion Resins (SBA):

●Functional group is weak base ●Perform better at low pH

●pH > 11 regeneration takes place

Operational capacity and regeneration efficiency of WBA is higher than
SBA

HCl H2 O H2 O
WBA SBA
H2CO3 H2CO3 H2 O

H2SiO3 H2 O
Cation effluent SBA
HCl H2 O

Principle of Deionisation:

In normal river water most common salts are present:

Ca++ HCO3 – , CO32–
Mg++ &
SO42– Ions
Na+ Cl–
SiO32–
If this water passes through a cation exchanger, all the cations are exchanged
with H+ of cation exchange resins.

R––H+ + CaCl2 R–– Ca++ + HCl

R––H+ + CaCO3 R–– Ca++ + H2CO3

pH drops around 3.5 and water becomes soft.

The above water is then passed through anion exchanger, all anions are
exchanged with OH– of SBA resins and equivalent amount of water is
produced.

H+–Cl– + R+–OH– R– Cl + H+OH– (H2O)

H2+CO32– + R+–OH– R– CO3 + H+OH– (H2O)

All the acids are converted to H2 O

 Selectivity of Ions

Resins have a preferences for exchange and it depends on charge and size of
the ion.

Triple charge is preferred to double and double is preferred to single charge.

Charge being same preference is given to bigger size ions.

Thus for cation: Ca++ > Mg++ > Na+ > H+

Similarly for anions: HSO4– > NO3– > Cl– > SiO32–
 Sodium Slip

When water containing Ca, Mg, Na ions is passed through cation

exchanger bed, Ca ions are retained in the 1st layer then Mg and in the last
layer Na ions are retained. Ion exchange reactions are all reversible.

The reaction in the bottom part of the bed is with sodium salt ( say NaCl)

R–H + NaCl R–Na + HCl

Now even at very low concentration of R–Na some back reaction produces
NaCl.

R–Na + HCl R–H + NaCl

 Effluent coming out from cation exchanger is not 100% acid but contain
a little amount of Sodium salt.

Increased bed depth reduces this amount of slip but never be reduced to
zero.

The cation effluent containing some sodium when passes through anion
exchanger, acids are converted to water but sodium salts are converted to
NaOH.

R–OH + NaCl R–Cl + NaOH

R–OH + HCl R–Cl + H2 O

Effluent coming out of anion bed contains NaOH that increases the pH and
conductivity of the anion effluent.

Similarly silica-ship takes place.

 Mixed Bed Units

After passing water through cation and then through anion exchanger, it is passed
through mixed bed unit – resulting final effluent of very good quality water.

SAC SBA MB

Further, H2SO3 produced in SAC can be easily removed at low running cost in a
Degasifier.

SAC Degasser SBA MB

 D.M. PLANT

From filter water, chlorine is removed before allowing it to enter ion exchanger. It
may be done by:

(a) Passing through activated carbon filter which absorbs chlorine.

(b) Dosing calculated amount of sodium sulphate, which reduces

chlorine to chloride ion.

Depending upon the amount of water to be treated and quality of the filter water,
different types of demineralization schemes are made.
(1) Simplest Arrangement:

Cation Unit Degasser Anion Unit M.B.Unit

(SAC) (SBA)

(2) Where water requirement is more:

Cation Unit WBA Degasser SBA MB

(3) Where water contains more carbonate/ bicarbonate and

requirement is more.

WAC SAC WBA Degasser SBA MB

 Regeneration of Cation Exchanger:

Regeneration of the cation exchanger is done when the sodium leakage increases to
certain pre set value.
The following steps are observed in regeneration.

(i) Backwash:

Backwash is done by up flow of water with air scouring. Purpose of backwash is

to loose the bed and remove accumulated suspended solids, dirt, resin fines,
fragments etc.

(ii) Acid Injection:

After backwash acid injection is required at specified concentration. Contact time

is normally 30 min. Two types of acids are used (a) sulphuric acid (b)
hydrochloric acid
After acid injection the bed is rinsed with water, first at slower rate and then at higher
rate. Volume used is 30-40 gall. Cubic ft.

Weak Acid Cation Exchanger

For regeneration of weak acid cation exchanger acid strength may be 0.8 to 1%.

If WAC exists in the stream then normally acid coming out of SAC unit as the
time of its regeneration is passed through the WAC to regenerate it. This is
therefore called regeneration.
 Anion Exchanger Resin’s Regeneration
The following steps are observed for regeneration of Anion Exchange Units:

(i) Backwash: Backwashing is done to loose the bed and remove

resin fines and fragments. Normal backwash rate is
2-4 g pm/sq.ft. for 10 minutes.

(ii) Injection of Caustic: 4% caustic at 4-8 Ibs/cubic ft. resin is

injested for a contact time of about 1 hr.
For better removal of silica particularly
in WBA/SBA combination higher
regenerant level more contact time and higher
temperature of regenerant (50°C) may be needed.
(iii) Rinse: Slow rinse at 1 g pm/sq.ft, then fast rinse at 5 to 8 g pm/sq.ft.
for 1 to 1½ hour may be required to bring down the
conductivity and silica to acceptable level. Volume used is 40-100
gal/cubic ft.

WBA:

End point of WBA is detected by increase in the conductivity and lowering of

pH.

The Regeneration of WBA need about 1%NaOH. Therefore regeneration is done

for WBA where SBA outlet caustic is injected to WBA with some modification to
avoid silica precipitation in the WBA unit.
 Regeneration of Mixed Bed
MB is normally regenerated when the effluent conductivity is more than present value
of silica is more than 0.02ppm.

The following steps are observed at the time of regeneration.

(i) Air Scrubbing: Water is drained to top of the resin bed and air
scrubbing is done for 10 min.

(ii) Back Washing: Unit is filled with water and back washing is
done at 4-9 g pm/sq. ft.; then the resin is
allowed to settle for 10 minutes which
separates the anion and cation resin.

(iii) Regeneration of Anion Resin Bed: Regeneration of anion

resin bed is done with 4% caustic at 12 lbs/cubic ft resins.
(iv) Rinse of the Anion Resin Bed: For about an hour until effluent
conductivity is below 10ms/cm.

(v) Regeneration of Cation Resin Bed: Regeneration of

cation resin bed is done with 4% acid
at a regeneration level 8-12lbs/cubic ft.

(vi) Rinse of Cation Resin Bed: Till conductivity less than

10ms/cm (20 minutes)
(vii) Mixing of the Resins: The water is drained down to the
surface of the resin bed and mixing is
done by air blowing for about 5 minutes
then is allowed to settle.
(viii) Final Rinse: After mixing the unit is refilled with water and
put to final rinse till the effluent comes to the
acceptable limit.
 Mixed Bed Outlet Water Quality

Conductivity: 0.2 – 0.3 micro S/cm

pH : 6.8 – 7.2

SiO2 : < 0.02 ppm

DEGASSIFIER

After the cation exchanger the effluent is acid and all the bicarbonate present in
water is converted to CO2. This CO2 can be removed in Degasser very cheaply.
DM Water Storage
 DALTON’S LAW:

The total pressure exerted by a mixture of several gases is equal to the sum of the
partial pressures of individual gas.

According to Charle’s law the partial pressure of each gas is determined by the
amount of that gas in the mixture.

HENRY’S LAW:
The solubility of the gas in water is directly proportional to the partial pressure of
that gas in contact with water.
X = P/H

X = amount of gas dissolved in water.

P = partial pressure of the gas in contact with water
H = constant at that temperature
Solubility of the gases decreases as the temperature of the solvent is increased.
When water reaches its saturation temperature all the uncombined gases are
theoretically insoluble in it and may be removed.

Solubility of a gas may be decreased to effect more complete from water in

several ways
(i) By lowering the partial pressure by inserting another gas in contact
with water.
(ii) By decreasing the pressure.

(iii) By lowering the partial pressure by heating the water to boiling

point corresponding to the pressure of the steam introduced.
In case of removing CO2 from cation effluent principal is normally adopted.

X = P/H P = Partial pressure of CO2 in atmosphere

X = concentration of CO2 dissolved in water.
 COUNTER FLOW REGENERATION:

In the conventional ion exchanger during service run, water flows from top to bottom
through the resin bed and the regeneration is done in the same direction.

Since like operation, Regeneration is not 100% the bottom part of the bed contains
more ions. During service, when the final treated water leaves the bed it passes
through less regenerated portion of the bed and thus picks up more ions.

If regenerant is injected from bottom to top then the bottom portion of the bed
will be better regenerated.

During service when treated under leaves the bed it passes through the better
regenerated bottom position and ion pick up is less. This gives a better
quality of water and Regeneration level is low.
The requirements of CFR are as below:

(1) The exchanger should have normal arrangement for down flow
service.

(2) Back washing is required time to time to regrade the bed and
remove dirt & fines. For this 50 – 100% free expansion space is to be
provided.

(3) Resin must be free to shrink and swell during the cycle.

(4) Arrangement is to be made to hold the bed packed and

immobile during up flow regeneration.