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Meet boiler water quality and efficiency demands
Reliable power starts with reliable water. The source water entering your steam and power generation loop can have a wide variety of contamination variables that need to be treated before being used in a power generation system. Particulate loads, suspended solids, dissolved silica, and ionic contamination may fluctuate by source and season. Your filtration approach will change based on what is in the water.
Then, there are dissolved gases that quietly chip away at uptime. Dissolved oxygen and CO₂ in boiler feedwater and condensate accelerate the formation of metallic oxides and pitting corrosion in turbines, economizer tubes, and heat exchangers. Elevated CO₂ pulls down ion exchange efficiency and pushes up resin bed regeneration frequency, which can compound chemical consumption, blowdown frequency, and unplanned downtime.
How filtration and dissolved gas control work together
Get more out of every stage. Particulate filtration, using nominally rated depth cartridges and high-flow, absolute-rated, pleated media, sits upstream to protect reverse osmosis membranes, ion exchange resins, membrane contactors, and turbine components from fouling and mechanical wear.
From there, Liqui-Cel EXF Membrane Contactors take on dissolved gases by flowing water over the shell side of microporous hydrophobic hollow fibers. A vacuum or sweep gas on the lumen side creates the concentration gradient that pulls O₂ and CO₂ through the membrane pores. The result is a chemical-free gas transfer that reaches low-ppb dissolved oxygen and sub-ppm CO₂ levels demanded by high-pressure boilers.
The combination can reduce ion exchange load, help protect equipment, such as boilers, heat exchangers, and turbines, from corrosion, and support lower blowdown rates across the steam cycle.
Filtration in power and steam vs. conventional approaches
Three operational comparisons distinguish our approach from conventional alternatives:
- Liqui-Cel EXF Membrane Contactors can achieve dissolved gas removal comparable to vacuum towers and forced-draft deaerators in a smaller footprint, at lower operating pressure, and without using chemicals.
- Membrane contactor degasification may reduce reliance on chemical scavengers for oxygen control, thereby lowering chemical handling requirements, inventory, and downstream conductivity impacts.
- High Flow Filter Cartridges with large-format, absolute-rated, pleated media can offer greater surface area, longer service intervals, less downtime, and fewer filter changeouts versus other types of filters, all with the 99.9% removal efficiency that an absolute-rated filter provides.
This integrated approach is designed to lower the total cost of ownership and help protect the downstream equipment you rely on.
Steam and power solutions, mapped to your process
Wherever you are in the water cycle, there is a solution built for that stage. The steam and power generation solutions portfolio is organized by application area, so you can navigate directly to the point in your plant that matters.
Protect the heart of your plant. Dissolved oxygen and CO₂ in feedwater accelerate the formation of metallic oxides and pitting corrosion in boiler tubes, economizers, and turbine stages. Residual particulates can contribute to deposition on heat-transfer surfaces, reduced heat-transfer efficiency, and higher fuel consumption.
Liqui-Cel EXF Membrane Contactors operate in-line to reduce dissolved O₂ and CO₂ down to low levels without chemical scavengers, supporting reduced chemical use, fewer blowdown cycles, and increased ion exchange efficiency, and higher water quality. High Flow Filter Cartridges serve as the upstream particulate-protection step, addressing particle loads before the membrane contactors and protecting RO membranes and ion-exchange beds from premature wear.
This integrated approach can support lower chemical demand, lower blowdown rates, and extended boiler life to keep your plant generating.
Recover every drop and protect it. Condensate recovered from steam turbines, piping, valves, pumps, and heat exchangers carries corrosion byproducts—predominantly iron and copper oxides—along with trace amounts of silica and sodium that must be controlled before the water is returned to the boiler. Uncontrolled contamination can lead to premature ion exchange resin exhaustion, deposition in the steam cycle, and loss of unit efficiency.
High Flow Filter Cartridges can enable high-efficiency particulate capture with a long service life for condensate polishing applications, supporting reduced changeout frequency and consistent protection of downstream mixed bed resins. Micro-Klean RT Filter Cartridges add graded-density filtration engineered for the variable iron oxide loads typical of condensate return streams.
Keep your cooling loops running clean. Open recirculating and closed-loop cooling systems collect silt, airborne dust, biological contamination, and scale precursors over recirculation cycles. Smart side-stream filtration takes those contaminants out of play and may support lower chemical demand for dispersants, biocides, and scale inhibitors.
High Flow Filter Cartridges handle the variable contamination loads of cooling tower water, bringing large-format pleated media, graded-density filtration, long service intervals, and straightforward changeout procedures to industrial flow rates.
Done right, side-stream filtration can support lower blowdown rates, extended tower life, and reduced makeup water consumption. In short, controlling contamination in your cooling loops is a direct lever you have for long-term plant reliability and a lower total cost of ownership.
Strip out the gases that wear your plant down. Hollow fiber membrane contactors can reduce dissolved O₂ and CO₂ in boiler feedwater and ultrapure water (UPW) loops without sulfite, hydrazine, or amine dosing, supporting the low-ppb oxygen targets required for high-pressure boilers. Reducing CO₂ load can improve ion exchange efficiency, lower the frequency of resin bed regeneration, and help electrodeionization (EDI) meet water quality targets.
In systems incorporating double-pass reverse osmosis, caustic injection is commonly used to adjust pH. Liqui-Cel Membrane Contactors may serve in lieu of caustic injection and, in some cases, may reduce the need for a second-pass RO step. It’s dissolved gas control that simplifies your operation, cuts chemical costs, and reduces system complexity.
You are being asked to meet increasingly stringent regulatory and discharge requirements without expanding treatment footprint or adding chemical overhead. That is where we can help. Condensate polishing regenerant streams, cooling water side streams, flue gas condensate, and process water treatment loops can carry ammonia nitrogen, total nitrogen, and other constituents that fall under discharge limits.
Liqui-Cel Membrane Contactors can be used in a TransMembrane ChemiSorption (TMCS) process for ammonia removal and recovery.
To keep those contactors running at optimal conditions, High Flow Filter Cartridges can protect and extend the service life of Liqui-Cel EXF Membrane Contactor modules as pre-membrane filters upstream of the contactor.
Explore products built for steam and power processes
The filtration and dissolved gas control portfolio for steam and power is designed for particulate filtration and chemical-free degasification.
Product links on this page currently direct to Solventum.com. Product information will soon be available on Thermofisher.com as part of our ongoing integration.
Frequently asked questions
Particulate filtration protects downstream reverse osmosis membranes, ion exchange resins, and turbine components from fouling and mechanical wear, extending service intervals and reducing unplanned maintenance. On top of that, membrane contactor-based degasification can reduce dissolved O₂ and CO₂ without chemical scavenging. The combined result may include lower blowdown rates, reduced chemical demand, extended equipment life, and lower fuel consumption from improved heat transfer across boilers and heat exchangers.
Dissolved oxygen and CO₂ are the primary operational concerns in steam and power generation. Oxygen fuels the formation of metallic oxides and pitting corrosion across boiler tubes, economizers, and turbine stages, accelerating wear on the components you cannot afford to lose. CO₂ lowers condensate pH, which can accelerate ion exchange resin exhaustion and increase regeneration. Liqui-Cel EXF Membrane Contactors can address both gases to low levels without the need for sulfite, hydrazine, or amine dosing.
Conventional oxygen control relies on sulfite or hydrazine dosing; CO₂ control typically uses amine-based treatment programs. Both approaches add chemical costs, inventory, and handling requirements, with downstream effects on conductivity and ion-exchange loading. By contrast, Liqui-Cel Membrane Contactors can handle O₂ and CO₂ via physical gas transfer across hollow-fiber membranes using a compact, chemical-free footprint with lower energy consumption than conventional spray-tower alternatives.
Related resources
Intended use of the products mentioned on this page vary. For specific intended use statements, please refer to the Instructions for Use for the product.