Ecodur 201: Coating a South Carolina Pump Room (Heritage Water)

Water treatment plants require special consideration when comes to the use of coatings as it is paramount that no contamination takes place, not matter how seemingly trivial. Over time it has been shown that some chemicals can be carcinogenic or cause other genetic damage even in nearly undetectable trace amounts. Other chemicals can be corrosive in small amounts too and start destroying even robust materials such as concrete.

In this case study involving Georgetown County Water and Sewer in Pawleys Island, South Carolina, the issue was in the chemical feed room where they use a power caustic chemical called sodium hydroxide and orthophosphate. Both were aggressively infiltrating the concrete support floor and causing severe damage.

Problem
Many conventional epoxy coatings simply cannot protect against caustic and acid solutions. Furthermore, even ones that do provide a measure of protect fail quickly through micro-cracking cause by vibrations, impact stress, or simple contraction and expansion caused by fluctuating temperatures. Once they start to fail, the damaging liquids can quickly creep through the microscopic cracks and cause the coating to lift away, further exacerbating the problem.

Another problem was, the company wanted a coating that would not fill a confined space with noxious and potentially dangerous fumes such as Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs). And being a water treatment plant, the company also wanted the coating to be non-toxic, and, of course highly resistance to caustic substances.

Solution
Ecodur 201M was chosen because not only does it not emit VOCs, it is highly resistant not just to caustic solutions but also a wide variety of acids. It is completely non-toxic and has an NSF/ANSI-61 potable water rating. It also has a top rating as a fire-retardant coating as heat makes it give off water vapor.

With standard protective gear only required, there was no need for special air supplies during the manual process as none of the ultra-high adhesion Ecodur became airborne. Ecodur has about double the adhesion qualities compared to conventional epoxies and it is especially binding on skin, and eyewear protection is required even when manually applying Ecodur.

Application Results
Heritage Water carried out the manual application of the veggie-plastic coating over the entire horizontal area of the chemical feed room. A contractor had clean and then smoothed the surface with grout. The applicator then applied approximately 30 mils to the entire floor and 40 and 50 mils under the piping of the pumps with one orthophosphate pump still leaking slightly. The Ecodur was successfully applied in the leaky area and because of the quick onset of it setting up – about 30 minutes – the concrete floor because fully protected with full cure at about the 24-hour mark when the site was officially released back to the client after a final inspection.

This situation reflects on how successful Ecodur has been in protecting tanks in the oil and gas industry when it has, and continues to be, used to protect production water tanks, many of which handle a wide cocktail of chemicals including caustic ones.

Subsequent additional inspections by the client, reported complete satisfaction with Ecodur’s performance in his particularly harsh environment and the client is budgeting for additional protective coating work with Ecodur.