6-day intensive course on: “Operation and Maintenance of Distillation Processes”

Desalination is becoming viable alternative to cover the water shortage in many regions of the world. There are different desalination systems in commercial production but the reverse osmosis is presently more economical process and expected to improve further due to important developments in reverse osmosis membranes, energy recovery systems and pre-treatment systems. However, there are specific areas where distillation processes will continue to be an important source of water supply. Some of the reasons for continuing with distillation processes are:
- Cheap supply of fuel gas, or cogeneration steam from power production
- Local water conditions unsuitable for RO feed
- Existing distillers in good condition and will give many years of further service
A number of desalination projects proposed or in pipeline are based on distillation concept for a local water supply scheme. Thus, MEDRC believes it is important to continue with training courses on distillation processes and is organising an intensive course on many of the practical aspects of operating and maintaining these systems. This course on distillation practice will be held at the LPI Conference Hall in Tripoli, Libya, from 10 to 15 December 2007. The course is aimed at those who are new to distillation and those who wish to improve their knowledge and understand the operation and maintenance of distillation processes. It will be of particular interest to many of these engineers familiar with the power industry, and who now find their duties that include cogeneration systems consisting of boilers, turbines and distillation units. The course will commence with a two-day introduction on the fundamentals of thermal distillation processes and will continue for four days concentrating on the practical aspects of distillation. Major part of the course will be centred on multi-stage flash (MSF), but the design, operation and maintenance of thermo- compression multi-effect distillers (TC MED) will also be covered.
The first two days lectures will be presented by Mr. Salah Al-Hengari and Mr. Walid Elmudir from LPI and the following four days by Mr. Iain McGregor, UK, who has spent his lifetime on distiller operation, troubleshooting and problem solving. The course contents will cover:
• The basics of distillation, the flashing process, a description of the parts of a distiller, design aspects, and differences between designs and arrangements
• Distiller operation, essential services, start-up, steady operation and shutdowns
• Routine operation, load changes, items for special checks
• Control and instrument systems for normal operation
• Monitoring performance, water quality, production rates, reliability and availability, and presenting this information for decision making
• Factors which affect availability, common reasons for plant outages, annual overhauls, routine maintenance
• Factors affecting water production rates, with potential for improvement, testing to find production limits and winter operation
• Factors affecting thermal efficiency and the potential for improving efficiencies of existing distillers
• Methods for improving plant reliability, elimination of problem areas, causes of tube leaks, corrosion problems, pump operation, etc.
• Some of the reasons for poor water quality
• Life expectancy of MSF distillers, potential improvements to technical specifications
• An introduction to some of the problems associated with the management of a distillation facility
During the course a number of special case studies will be covered to show how faults can be detected and improvements implemented. Candidates will be encouraged to take an active part in technical discussions and to raise specific problems encountered in their own installations.