Essentially all industries include treatments with corrosion inhibitors and biocides as a part of their control of general corrosion, localized corrosion, and microbiologically influenced corrosion (MIC) in cooling waters and process waters. Most such treatments rely exclusively on monitoring the concentrations of the control chemicals rather than monitoring the effectiveness of those treatments. Inhibitors and biocides are expensive, can produce undesirable side effects as they interact with other chemicals, and will always be subject to effluent controls. Overdosing of treatment chemicals, especially oxidizing biocides, will have undesirable side effects, including increased corrosion of piping, heat exchangers, and process equipment.
Case histories from a number of industries have shown that treatment optimization can be achieved by effectively monitoring the effectiveness of the treatments with simple sensors and integrated data acquisition and data analysis capabilities.
