A critical evaluation of physical water treatment for the prevention of scale

M.Sc.Calcium carbonate scale formation is a major problem in industrial water and cooling systems as well as in household systems. The resulting reduction in heat transfer and the removal of the scale are very costly processes. One of the methods used in the past 50 years and investigated for nearly a century, is the use of physical fields to reduce, remove and / or inhibit scale formation. These physical fields are usually magnetic fields, but RF electric and electrostatic fields are also used. These fields are claimed to reduce the cost involved in the removal of scale to a minimum. To investigate these claimed effects on scale formation, a pure calcium bicarbonate solution was exposed to some of the commercial available units: The exposed solution was then forced to precipitate by elevating the temperature. The pH was monitored against time, to investigate the nucleation process of CaCO 3 and the resulting precipitate analysed for changes in crystal morphology. The principle conclusions made from the results were, firstly that the nucleation of CaCO 3 was significantly delayed in one of the units tested and that the preferred morphology was changed from the thermodynamically more stable calcite to the more unstable aragonite in that unit. Secondly, that a direct correlation existed between the release of trace amounts of metals from the unit and the observed effects