I hope all of you were as happy as I was to ring in the new year. With COVID vaccines getting in arms across the world, there is every reason to be excited about things to come.
I’m certainly excited to share with you the slate of features and product sections in this issue.
I had the honor of writing our cover story, which looks at a first-of-its kind report on water usage in the cannabis industry. Farmers for nearly every crop can lean on decades of agriculture data about the plants they grow, but because of the legal status of cannabis throughout much of the country, such resources are hard to come by for marijuana cultivators. That’s why the Resource Innovation Institute compiled the Cannabis Water Report, which leverages data from the nonprofit’s free online benchmarking platform, Cannabis PowerScore. I hope the article is as interesting to read as it was to report on.
On page 8, Paul Sharpe with Kurita explains how to perform a brine elution study, which can help troubleshoot and evaluate an ion exchange process.
“Brine draw evaluation is the first step in diagnosing a hard water excursion in a water softener,” Sharp writes. “Small variations in cycle timing, flow rates or salt concentrations can have a significant impact on the softener output quality and can ultimately affect the operation costs of equipment requiring the soft water.”
On page 12, David Amory with AESSEAL discusses pump sealing solutions that can help operations conserve water.
According to Armory, “With some industrial plants operating hundreds of pumps, it is not difficult to calculate how the energy costs of the heating, cooling and evaporation of flush water, or the management/effluent costs of discarding it, can mount up.”
On page 16 is an expansion of a previous Water Technology article about improving water/steam chemistry in industrial steam generating networks. The latest article shows how condensate and feedwater iron monitoring can alert operators and technical personnel to corrosion issues and can be used to optimize chemical treatment programs.
This issue’s case study looks at Mueller Water Product’s HYMAX Versa couplers and how they offered an Idaho irrigation district an ideal approach for replacing dresser multi-bolt couplings.
“With the wraparound coupling, the test section of the pipes was repaired without removing pipe sections from their location,” writes Denny Setzer. “As a result, A&B Irrigation plans to save tens of thousands of dollars in labor costs and renting the necessary equipment to otherwise complete the project.”
As always, we have collected an assortment of new products for your consideration, as well as two product spotlights focusing on membranes and flow, level and pressure measurement.
Thanks to all the contributors and companies that provided material for this issue, and thanks so much to our readers! WT
