Performance of a novel fluorescent-tagged polyacrylate at a cooling tower test facility: a bench-scale and industrial-scale evaluation

• S. Kamagurov¹, M. Oshchepkov^1,2, D.G. Nazarov³, S. Mancini⁴, K. Popov¹, S. Tkachenko^1,2 and G. Rudakova¹

¹ PJSC “Fine Chemicals R&D Centre”, Krasnobogatyrskaya, 42, str.1, 107258 Moscow, Russian Federation
² Mendeleev University of Chemical Technology of Russia, Miusskaya sq. 9, 125047 Moscow, Russian Federation
³ EMEC Russia LLC, 123423, Narodnogo Opolchenia street, 34 bld.3 office 214, Moscow, Russian Federation
⁴ EMEC SRL, Via Donatori di Sangue, 1 - 02100 Rieti, Italy

Abstract: The ability of fluorescent 1,8-napthalimide-tagged polyacrylate PAA-F1 to serve as an “on line” indicator of polymeric scale inhibitor concentration has been tested in dynamic bench scale tests operating with EMEC facility, and in an industrial-scale in situ experiment run at a “Rosinka 10/20” cooling tower that provides the circulating water cooling of heat exchangers at rectification columns of ECOS-1 Co. site in Staraya Kupavna city, Russia. It has been demonstrated that the static beaker tests and the dynamic bench- and industrial-scale experiments may reveal rather different results. The latter exhibited a much higher sensitivity to the background iron cation concentration. It has been found that PAA-F1 may lose up to 17% of fluorescence intensity, while the losses of indifferent tracer, tetrasodium salt of 1,3,6,8-pyrenetetrasulfonic acid (PTSA) can exceed 80%. The Benсh-scale dynamic experiments on the fluorescence intensity of a fluorescent-tagged scale inhibitor at elevated concentrations of the background cations are recommended as an inevitable step for a proper estimation of fluorescent tracer validity for in situ applications. An industrial-scale 30-day experiment has demonstrated a good agreement of the fluorescent data with the conventional methods of cooling water control, and the feasibility of 1,8-naphthalimide tagged polyacrylate PAA-F1 application for in situ polymer concentration monitoring “on line”.

Keywords: water treatment, 1,8-napthalimide-tagged polyacrylate, scale inhibition, fluorescence, in situ polyacrylate concentration monitoring

Int. J. Corros. Scale Inhib., 2018, 7, no. 3, 418-426 PDF (951 K)
doi: 10.17675/2305-6894-2018-7-3-11

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