Removal of nitrogen containing reducing agents from water coolant systems using ion exchange resin and membranes

Abstract

ABSTRACTOxidizing environment prevailing in water coolant systems aggravates the corrosion of structural materials. Reducing agents are added to the reactor coolant systems to control the oxidants and mitigate material corrosion. Maintenance of required concentration of the reducing agents in the system and their removal after completing the processes can be done using ion exchange resins as well as ion exchange membranes. In this article, a comparative study on the efficacy in removing the reducing agents from aqueous solutions by the cation exchange resin and membranes such as sulfonated polysulfone and nafion is evaluated. Some of the membranes were synthesized in the laboratory and characterized by SEM, FTIR and pure water flux studies. Nitrogen containing reducing agents such as hydrazine, hydroxylamine, and ammonium hydroxide have been chosen for the study. Results indicate that strong acid cation exchange (SAC) resin taken in a column and sulfonated polysulfone (SPSf) membrane as a stack are found to be equally efficient in purification of coolant system from the added reducing agents. Uptake of metal ions was observed to be higher on SAC resin column in presence of reducing agent. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Appl. Polym. Sci. 2017, 134, 44588.