Chapter 1 - Industrial Biofouling

Abstract

Industrial problems associated with the accumulation of microorganisms from flowing water on the surfaces of industrial processing equipment increase operating costs. The presence of biofilm reduces the flow area and generally presents a rough surface to the fluid flow in equipment such as heat exchangers, so that for a given design throughput, the pumping energy requirement and the associated cost will be much greater than if there was no biofilm. The cost of unwanted biofilm accumulation on the surface of industrial equipment can represent a large proportion of the total operating cost and the initial capital cost in making allowance for the likely problem of biofouling. Even though the potential problems due to biofouling may have been recognized at the design stage, it may still be necessary to take remedial action to prevent or restrict the development of biofilms on the surfaces of industrial equipment. Under this, it may be necessary to clean equipment affected by biofilm accumulation from time to time. Furthermore it may be necessary to treat the “wash water” before discharge into the public sewers or back into the environment. All such remedial actions involve additional costs. In order to offset some of these costs, it is prudent to duplicate equipment, again with increased capital costs, so that during the cleaning of one equipment set, the other set can be operated and production can be maintained.