With heating season now upon us, everyone is looking for ways to run their boiler systems more efficiently. One component of that system is the feedwater - and one variable of the feedwater is its temperature. What is a target temperature for your feedwater? Efficiently running systems will maintain a feedwater temperature above 180 degrees F. This maximizes the amount of condensate that is returned and combined with the colder makeup water, resulting in a pre-heated inflow to the boiler.
What happens when the feedwater temperature is below 180 degrees F? Excessive use of the chemical oxygen scavenger can occur, as well as thermal shock to boiler components, and corrosion of feedwater, boiler, and condensate components. These possibilities are not something you want to face.
How do you raise the feedwater temperature?
- return additional condensate
- preheat the makeup
- waterfeed a regulated amount of steam into the feedwater tank
In one of our blogs next week, we will go through an example of what happens when you adjust the feedwater temperature by only 20 degrees.