Duties on Activated Carbon from the People's Republic of China

Effective on October 11, 2006, duties on steam activated carbon from the People's Republic of China will have duties imposed between 13.78% to 228.11%.

What does this mean?
Res-Kem has been visited and/or notified by our suppliers that all activated carbon prices are increasing to a greater or lesser degree.

How can Res-Kem help?
Res-Kem has anticipated that this may occur. Through our buying power and our good working relationships with our key activated carbon vendors, we have options to help reduce the impact of the price increases.

What happened?
On October 4, 2006, David Spooner, Assistant Secretary for Import Administration at the US Department of Commerce, USDOC, issued a "Preliminary Determination of Sales at Less Than Fair Value and Postponement of Final Determination: Certain Activated Carbon From the People's Republic of China". Click here for the full text of the release.

Why did this happen?
On March 8, 2006, the USDOC, received a petition on imports of certain activated carbon from the PRC from Calgon Carbon Corporation and Norit Americas Inc because they felt the products were being sold at "Less Than Fair Value" a.k.a. "Dumped". This investigation was initiated on March 28, 2006.

USDOC Summary of Determination
"SUMMARY: We preliminarily determine that certain activated carbon from the People's Republic of China ("PRC'') is being, or is likely to be, sold in the United States at less than fair value ("LTFV''), as provided in section 733 of the Tariff Act of 1930, as amended ("the Act''). The estimated margins of sales at LTFV are shown in the "Preliminary Determination'' section of this notice."

What's Next?
The USDOC will make a final determination early next year.

Res-Kem Re-Certified by Commonwealth of Pennsylvania

On October 23, 2006, the Department of General Services, of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, re-certified Res-Kem Corp as a Woman Business Enterprise.

NASA Water Treatment System and Oxygen Generation

There are many difficult water treatment problems we all deal with on a daily basis. Few are life and death like this application.

I am on a wide variety of email newsletters. Here was an interesting article on how scientists at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) are working on taking all available sources of water in a space craft or space station and reclaiming them for reuse. This includes humidity and urine! Overall they achieve 93% recovery of the water.

The name of the project is Environmental Control and Life Support Systems, ECLSS, and is pronounced "EE-cliss".

What is also interesting is they are using part of the water to generate oxygen by electrolysis. In this way, long term mission on the Moon or to Mars can be feasible. In order for this to happen, they need to increase the recovery closer to 100%

New Calcium Carbonate Brochure From Imerys

Imerys Performance Minerals of Roswell, Georgia just released its first brochure for its extensive line of NSF-certified calcium carbonate media for:
- pH adjustment
- Corrosion control
- Remineralization of desalinated water

Many forms of calcite media are available, but not all are safe for use in drinking water. The Imerys media has been tested and certified by the NSF International to NSF/ANSI Standard 60. There are five different NSF-certified grades of calcium carbonate media:
- 40-200(TM) NSF sourced from Marble Hill, Georgia and Sylacauga, Alabama
- 30-50(TM) NSF sourced from Marble Hill, Georgia
- XO White(TM) NSF sourced from Marble Hill, Georgia
- Z White(TM) NSF sourced from Marble Hill, Georgia
- OZ White(TM) NSF sourced from Marble Hill, Georgia

Res-Kem Corp stocks XO White NSF and Z White NSF for immediate shipment. We can provide the other media grades upon request.

Res-Kem Re-Certified by the WBENC

At the request of many customers, Res-Kem has a yearly audit to insure that we continue to meet the requirements of The Women's Business Enterprise National Council (WBENC). The WBENC is the largest, independent, third-party certifier of businesses owned and operated by women in the United States. We are proud to inform our customers that Res-Kem has been re-certified for 2007 as a WBENC-Certified woman-owned business and a leader in residential, commercial, municipal and industrial water treatment systems.

Most importantly, customers do business with Res-Kem because we are great at what we do, providing the highest quality water treatment equipment, filter media, ion exchange resins, replacement parts, equipment service and Service DI, not merely because we are woman-owned. With that said, there are many corporations of various sizes that have internal targets designed to increase opportunities for women-owned businesses to work with them. We can help you meet these targets.

Dow Introduces Two New Dowex Marathon Ion Exchange Resins

In some industry news, The Dow Chemical Company told us two new products were added to Demineralization price list. These ion exchange resins are Dowex Marathon 650C (H) and Dowex Marathon 550A (OH). These resins are used for polishing mixed beds that do not require nuclear-grade specifications, and where good color differential and excellent separation are required.

Dowex and Marathon are trademarks of The Dow Chemical Corporation

Can you analyze ion exchange resin and what do you require?

Answer:
The short answer is YES. We analyze ion exchange resin and the procedure is simple!

Background Information:
The redesigned Res-Kem web site is a great resource for water treatment products and services. We have made every attempt to make the site easy to navigate. Since there is so much information on www.reskem.com, periodically I will highlight products and services that may need additional exposure.

One of the services I would like to highlight is our resin analysis service. Your resin sample is analyzed for its:
- Chemical properties - the capacity of the resin to remove ions
- Physical properties - the percentage of whole, cracked, and broken resin beads
- Mix - the percentage of cation resin and anion resin
- Regeneration Efficiency (if applicable)
- Organic Fouling (if applicable)

Procedure:
You will need to take a representative sample of the resin in your vessels. This is very simple process if your equipment has been properly designed. Simply remove the manway or top mount valve from the tank. Drive a semi-rigid tube or pipe into the bed and educt or vacuum with a small clean shop type vacuum. A one-quart sample is ideal for resin analysis.

Prior to shipping your resin sample, contact Res-Kem at 800-323-1983 or 610-358-0717 so we are prepared to handle your resin sample.

We will need a purchase order and copy of the Resin Analysis Submittal Form faxed to us at 610-358-4642 OR e-mailed to sales@reskem.com. The samples must have a copy of that fax or email document attached on the outside of the box. A minimum 3 oz. sample is required of INDIVIDUAL RESINS and 8 oz. for MIXED RESINS, but a quart is preferred.

The cost of the services is detailed in this price list.

My backwash flow rate is too high for my well and well pump

A common design issue for sand filters, multi-media filters, greensand filters, arsenic removal units, etc. is the large difference between the backwash flow rate and the flow rate during normal operation. Depending upon the media used, the backwash flow rate can be 2X to 10X the service rate. Due to restrictions in the piping coming to the unit or the well feeding the plant, the unit cannot get an adequate backwash flow rate. Most water supplies are not designed to handle such a wide swing in flow rate and the drain line will have to be appropriately up-sized. In particular, a plant well water source can not be cost effectively sized for such a large flow difference.

To address this predicament, Res-Kem has been selling triplex sand filters, multi-media filters, greensand filters, arsenic removal units, etc. to reduce the backwash flow rate. The tradeoff is the cost of the extra valves and tanks with a backwash flow rate that is reduced by 50% for a continuous system and 67% for a non-continuous system.

Depending upon the size of the units, all of them can be skid mounted. This makes for a very simple field installation with a single electrical connection. Also, the skid will have a single feed, product, and drain connection.

An optional feature of a triplex skid is that a separate line for an alternate backwash source can be added. This allows for the use of a "clean" water source to backwash the units. If water storage is not available, two units can be used to backwash the third.

Why should I treat my boiler condensate?

A question that we receive frequently from visits to customers and potential customers is "Why should I treat my boiler condensate?"
Our Answer:
The reason why to treat your boiler condensate is condensate systems always leak. Heat exchangers are where most of the leakage problems start. Tube sheet and tube leaks, of shell and tube heat exchangers, are the typical cause. This is where untreated cooling water can contaminate the process water leading to corrosion. Every system must have a method to handle this leakage.

When a condensate system is not properly controlled or simply ignored, corrosion takes place. Iron, copper, and other harmful contaminants are washed back into the boiler systems. This wastes energy because these contaminants reduce heat transfer. Depending upon the type of contaminant, a layer of 1/32" can waste between 2% and 7% of the fuel used in the boiler. Wasted Fuel Graph

A simple solution is to blow down the boiler to improve water quality, but this wastes heat, requires more makeup water, and increases boiler water chemical usage.

The cost effective solution is to "polish" your contaminated condensate for reuse. As more condensate is reused, less make up water is required, reducing both chemical consumption and energy requirements.

Res-Kem Sodium Cycle Condensate Polishers are available in a wide range of self-contained packages configured in single, double, and triple unit arrangements to treat condensate return for reuse as boiler feedwater. The standard wetted parts for Res-Kem Condensate Polishers are stainless steel. Single units are rated for flows up to 710 gpm. For larger flow rates, contact Res-Kem to determine whether larger or multiple units would be best choice.

Contact Res-Kem to work up the energy savings available by polishing your dirty condensate. The payback is both swift and dramatic.Res-Kem Condensate Polisher specification sheet

Why do you not recommend using galvanized pipe on your water softeners?

A question often asked is materials of construction for water softeners. Summarized below, Res-Kem's Director of Engineering, Bob Hader answers in a recent "Engineering Notes":

"Corrosion can occur with any type of piping depending on the application, environment and precautions taken to prevent corrosion. We at Res-Kem find that steel piping with iron fittings offers the best balance of corrosion resistance and cost.

First, softened water has not shown to cause any more internal corrosion in steel or galvanized piping than hard water. Corrosion, which does occur with unlined steel tanks, piping & fittings or galvanized tanks pipe & fittings is generally caused by other factors. Some of these are pH, temperature, dissolved gasses (oxygen and carbon dioxide) in the water, contact with air and galvanic action.

The greatest contributor to corrosion we see with water treatment equipment is on the exterior surface of tanks, pipe and fittings. Given most water treatment is in areas where the air is warm (boiler rooms, laundries, non-air conditioned utility rooms) and the water is cold; condensation forms on everything. Uncoated or unprotected steel tanks, steel piping and cast iron valves will rust and corrode. Galvanized piping is not free from this problem. The corrosion will take place at the threads (which are not galvanized)."

Here is the complete Engineering Note.