Case Study: Mysterious

Makeup Water
By James McDonald, PE, CWT
Originally Published: CSTN August/September 2003

During a visit to a client one day, the Powerhouse Supervisor approached

the Water Management Specialist and said his makeup water usage to the
boilers was unusually low. The account had three large watertube boilers
with softened dealkalized makeup. The boiler operators kept a very close
eye on the operational parameters of their system and had noticed that the
amount of water passing through the dealkalizer water meters was half of
what it was normally.
What could cause this? Take a moment to consider this question. (See
Figure 1.)
City Water

Figure 1 – Mysterious Makeup Water

Softener

Softener
Dealkalizer
Dealkalizer

Condensate
Return

DA
Steam

Feedwater

3 Watertube
Boilers

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Causes of Low Makeup Rate
There are many possible causes to the low boiler makeup rate noticed by the
operators.
• Bad makeup water meter: One of the first items to check when
unusual data is seen is the recording instrument itself. A failing
water meter might not be measuring all the water flowing past its
sensor. The operators were on the ball here too in that they’d
compared the makeup water meter readings to the meter initiated
regenerations of the dealkalizers and they matched exactly.
• High Boiler Cycles/Conductivity: If the boiler was overcycled
with a higher conductivity, less blowdown would be occurring with
less makeup water required. The boilers at this account were run
exceptionally well, so the conductivities were exactly within
specifications as usual.
• Change in Makeup Quality: If the makeup water quality suddenly
got drastically better, the boiler could run on higher cycles and
require less blowdown and makeup. We checked the makeup water
and this was not the case.
• Accidentally Opened Valve: If a bypass valve or emergency water
valve were opened, the water meter may not have recorded this. The
makeup water piping and valving was thoroughly checked and no
possibilities of this were found.
• Increased Condensate Return: The amount of condensate returned
to the boiler has a direct impact on the makeup rate to a boiler.
Every gallon of condensate returned is one gallon of makeup not
required. A repaired condensate receiver or an area suddenly
returning condensate that never had before could be culprit. The
maintenance crew was questioned and there had been no repairs
done or new sections returning condensate to the Powerhouse. Since
this facility was a hospital, the maintenance crew would have been
directly responsible for such activities.
• Process In-Leakage: Even though there had been no new
condensate being sent to the Powerhouse, this did not rule out an
unknown in-leakage into the condensate system somewhere. There
were a few incidents of slightly higher feedwater conductivities, but
nothing consistent. Given that the percent condensate return was
rather high and the makeup rate was rather low by comparison, any
in-leakage could be very diluted before being measured in the

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 Powerhouse. Also, the amine usage had increased and the phosphate
levels had dropped slightly lower than normal, but still within range.
The Powerhouse supervisor had a gut feeling that something was
leaking into his condensate system and the water management
specialist agreed. A condensate survey was conducted.

Conclusion
It took two separate condensate surveys on two separate visits to find the
source of the in-leakage because it was intermittent. Finally a city water heat
exchanger out in the hospital was found. Once this heat exchanger was
repaired, the makeup rates, amine usage, and phosphate levels returned to
normal. The city water contamination had affected the amine usage and
phosphate levels because of the alkalinity and hardness in the water not being
removed by the normal boiler pretreatment equipment.
This case study proves once again that your best source of information at an
account can be the operators themselves. When operators take pride and
ownership in what they do, like at this account, the results are even better.

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