Power Utilities

H2O Tech’s Comprehensive Solutions

Your Problems  The highly competitive electric generation industry is under pressure to both lower costs while meeting increasingly stringent environmental requirements. As any power plant manager knows, water stewardship is an important component of a plant’s operational scheme. Clean water and its efficient use is an integral part of any steam powered plant. Consequently, whenever there is low quality water, power plant engineers are forced to use water treatment technologies.

Efficient Solutions: Sometimes, traditional methods of chemically treating water just don’t work as well as they could. That is where H2O Tech’s proprietary water treatment methods enter the picture. H2O Tech works with power plant developers and operators to design the most advanced raw water pre-treatment, as well as waste water treatment applications. We use proprietary, patented techniques utilizing a combination of bacteria and chemical technologies that provide far superior reduction in contaminants while simultaneously lowering costs.

Raw water can have a wide range of problems and contaminants, including Arsenic, Fluoride, Nitrate, Salt, Silica, Pathogens, Phosphorus, Hydrogen Sulfide, Heavy Metals, Benzene, and unbalanced pH. By using bio-augmentation, H2O Tech’s proprietary water treatment process, the company is able to create a particular biological agent that consumes whatever the contaminant problem is.

The Mesquite Power Plant located west of Phoenix, Arizona had a problem with silica in the source water emanating from the five 1000’ deep wells the plant used to create steam. After exhaustively trying one chemical after another to treat and remove the silica, Mesquite operators knew it was time for an innovative solution. Mesquite partnered with H2O Tech to develop a site specific biotechnology to improve silica removal efficiency. The program is tailored to alter the molecular structure of the soluble silica, which exists in a non-ionic state. Purefloc—the biological macromolecule H2O Tech created and then used to change the charge basis—creates an electron receptor capable of reacting with other elements. This increases particle size and allows physical treatment, enabling the silica to be removed prior to the cooling towers. To fully optimize the effect of the treatment chemicals, Mesquite also installed a flculator tube assembly just upstream of the existing clarification units (Figure). The proprietary technology is the first of its kind and Mesquite is the first power plant to implement the program.

“Because of the high soluble silica levels in the groundwater, the traditional methods of silica removal were not effective,” said Debbie Wetmore, Mesquite Gas Turbine Technician. “Once this condition was identified, we knew that in order to maximize plant efficiency, something different was needed,” Wetmore went on to say. Silica, if not removed efficiently can scale on heat transfer surfaces and reduce cooling tower efficiency, forcing the plant to increase its water use. As a result of their problem, Mesquite has contracted H2O Tech to treat their water and the plant’s cooling water problems have dissipated.

Scott Frazier, President of H20Tech, says the Purefloc his company introduced at Mesquite, has taken care of Mesquite’s water problems once and for all. “In order to make the program work, we looked at a number of different solutions and biotechnology, while it is on the cutting edge, offers Mesquite the ability to reduce their dependence on chemicals and solve the problem in an environmentally responsible manner.”

H2O Tech’s first goal is to reduce the wasting of water and its associated costs. The increase in efficiency from using H2O Tech’s proprietary technology consequently allows plant operators to reuse water to a much greater extent than historically possible.