The second industrial revolution began in the late 19th and early 20th centuries marking mass automation, moving assembly lines, setting-up of large-scale factories shaping the urban landscape.
Much of this industrial economic activity took place in Ontario and Québec, where early industrial setups had been established. During this period, Canada witnessed remarkable increase in the population majorly due to the boom in industrialisation and urbanisation. With the increase in population, it also led to the increase in the demand of basic necessities like food and water.
Montréal is the largest and oldest island city, a French-speaking province of Quebec. Being surrounded by major water bodies like the St. Lawrence River, the Rivière des Prairies, Lake Saint-Louis and Lac des Deux Montagnes, water was easily accessible for consumption. Later, it was identified that the quality of water around Montreal had deteriorated posing high risk to the human health and the ecosystem.
To address this issue, member municipalities of the newly created Urban Community of Montréal (MUC) agreed to build a wastewater treatment plant (WWTP). The disinfection process is part of a long-term vision taking into account the elimination of virus, bacteria and new emergent compounds including pharmaceutical products as well as surface-active agents, such as detergents.
The Montréal wastewater treatment plant processes 2.5 to 8 million cubic metres of wastewater daily, approximately 50% of Québec’s wastewater. The treatment plant gathers wastewater across the city and is then collected through pipe outlets in a 150 feet underground area. The wastewater is lifted to the ground level for treatment purpose using high capacity Vertical Turbine (VT) pumps – 17 nos. of approx. 2800 – 5100 HP each. During the water treatment process, immense heat is generated in the pumps due to friction which affects bearing life and the pumping efficiency. Hence chilled water is supplied to these pumps using Thermax absorption chillers that ensure reliability and efficiency of the pumps.
Thermax has commissioned two steam-driven vapour absorption chillers at the site. The first one being a 584 TR single effect steam-driven vapour absorption chiller unit installed back in 2009 followed by a 728 TR double effect steam-driven vapour absorption chiller unit installed in 2016.
During the treatment process, a huge amount of moist mud is burnt generating a large amount of waste heat which is used for producing steam at 6-7 bar g. This steam is used as a heat source in the absorption chillers and other processes. With our energy-efficient chillers, the Urban Community of Montréal (MUC) saves 7.04 million units of electricity and reduces their carbon emissions by 6,555 tonnes annually. With such installations, Thermax not only helps organisations meet their demands but also help them contribute positively towards the environment and communities.
Thermax pioneers in harnessing waste heat from various sources and provides innovative and sustainable solutions.
Thermax offers a range of steam driven vapour absorption machines driven by saturated steam pressure at 0.1 kg/cm2 to 26 kg/cm2. Steam driven VAMs are categorised as Single effect, Double effect and Triple effect depending on the heat source temperature.
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