The water produced by a desalting evaporator is usually very pure. However, if sea water, especially in an area of a large city, contains ammonia as one of it's volatile pollutants, it is supposed that some of the ammonia enters the product water. The behavior of ammonia is affected by temperature, pH and salinity in sea water. Therefore, it is difficult to predict the behavior of ammonia in a desalting evaporator.
In this paper, the behavior of ammonia in a multi-stage flash evaporator (MSF) is investigated by using simulation program which theoretically considered the effects upon ammonia behavior about temperature, pH, salinity, the buffer action of sea water and the oxgen concentration in solution.
As a result, experimental data of ammonia behavior in the 3,000 m
3/day, 39 stages desalting flash evaporation test plant are simulated accurately by the computer estimation. Particularly, the maximum point of ammonia concentration in the product water in the early stage of adding ammoia chloride to the make-up sea water can be explained for the first time in this theoretical estimation methods. It is clear that the behavior or ammonia in a MSF plant can be exactly estimated under varied conditions by using this methods.
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