It’s World Water Day, but do we truly understand the importance of water? What does water mean to you? I’ll share my own top picks, and provide some resources to help you learn more through water analysis.
Drinking water
The most important for us all is to have clean water to drink. That doesn’t mean it is 100% pure, with just H2O.
There is a nutritional need to ensure the right amount of ions and minerals in our drinking water to sustain our health. However, there are good natural matters that we need. But there are synthetic ones that we don’t need that come from the cleaning process. For example, bleaches used to clean tanks that hold the water may vary in amounts of inorganic and organic matter, the water temperature and pH, and the dose of disinfectant all contribute to the formation and variation of the disinfection byproducts (DBPs), which are harmful.
On the other hand, we want clean drinking water. So, we need to monitor contaminants and impurities that can have adverse effects on the environment and our health. For example, heavy metal contaminants can lead to a wide variety of health risks, from cardiovascular disorders to nerve damage to cancer. There are many regulations concerning drinking water because of its importance to our health.
Drinking water resources
Website: Drinking Water Analysis: Analytical solutions to ensure safe drinking water
Application note: Fast determination of anions in municipal drinking water using a compact ion chromatography system with a chemically regenerated suppressor
Website: Disinfection Byproducts Analysis
Application note: Fast and Robust Assessment of Water Quality using ICP-OES Multielement Analysis
Website: Analysis of Volatile Organic Compounds in Environmental Samples
Website: Gallery Aqua Master and Gallery Aqua Master discrete analyzers
Website: Water Regulations
Wastewater
Why is wastewater of interest? It is very localized and can tell many stories, from industrial leakage to the spreading of diseases. In the last few years, during the COVID-19 pandemic, wastewater revealed the badly affected areas and deemed that more control was needed.
Wastewater testing varies depending on the different National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permits to discharge back into the environment. For municipal wastewater tests, there are four categories: physical properties, solids, biologicals and chemicals. For industrial wastewater, the different heavy metals also may need monitoring.
Then, the surface water ꟷ the receiving water for discharged wastewater ꟷ is monitored to ensure that it does not contain contaminants higher than standards allow. For instance, high concentrations of nutrients (total nitrogen and total phosphorus) in surface water contribute to eutrophication, which depletes oxygen in water, leading to algal bloom (production of mycrocystins), bacteria growth, and death of aquatic animals ꟷ not so good for the environment.
Wastewater resources
Infographic: A solution to the top three analytical challenges in industrial water and wastewater processing
Website: Wastewater Analysis
Website: High-throughput biomarkers analysis wastewater SARS-CoV-2 surveillance
Website: Water analysis: The role of standardized ion chromatography
Water power
Nuclear power plants (NPP) generate nearly 20% of the total electricity in the U.S. and around 30% in Europe. In NPPs, water in secondary and cooling systems controls the heat created from the fission of radioactive isotopes to produce steam used to generate electricity. NPP water chemistry is most important to maintain nuclear safety, which is one of the main components contributing to reliability and the overall economic viability of plant operation. Each nuclear power plant has a set of water chemistry matrices that are often specific for that plant, usually based on the water chemistry history and metallurgy.
Corrosion inhibitors and oxygen scavengers are added to control the pH to create a reducing environment in the liquid and vapor phases of the NPP cooling system. Morpholine and ethanolamine (ETA) are the most commonly used organic amines in Europe and the U.S. for that purpose. They are monitored closely to ensure pH balance.
Boric acid is used in pressurized water reactor (PWR) power plants to control the nuclear reaction because boron is a good neutron absorber. The anionic contaminants determination in borated waters is important for corrosion monitoring. Believe me, you don’t want corrosion in any reactors!
Water power resources
Website: Nuclear Energy Information
Website: Determination of Morpholine, Ethanolamine, and Hydrazine in Simulated Nuclear Power Plant Wastewater
Website: Trace borate determination in high-purity waters
Website: Ion Chromatography – Power Plant Water Applications Summary Notebook
Related information
Blog: Practical Analysis Solutions to Enhance Water Quality for a Safer Future
Blog: Water Management for Industrial and Chemical Manufacturers to Enhance Sustainability and Efficiency
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