This summer, while you were on vacation, working hard or doing a little of both, a group of folks at Jana Laboratories were busy doing their homework, or regular work, rather.
The Jana Laboratories technical report “Impact of Potable Water Disinfectants on PE Pipe” is a science project that has resounding effects on the high density polyethylene (HDPE) pipe industry.
Here’s why it’s important – HDPE’s resistance to disinfectants has been put into question by others looking for a way to promote other pipe materials. Those questions, raised by others, are now answered with the evidence within this report that HDPE can handle disinfectants and can handle them well over 100 years.
Commissioned by the Plastics Pipe Institute (PPI) and the Alliance for PE Pipe, the study conducted by Jana Laboratories uses several case studies and research to examine various areas of potable water systems including chlorination, durability, oxidative aggressiveness, temperature, pressure and stress.
“The base resin in a PE pipe formulation is highly engineered to provide the balance of properties required by the end-use application,” stated Tony Radoszewski, executive director of the PPI. “This latest study helps to answer the question ‘How will PE pipe perform in my utility?’ and identifies the areas that should be addressed during an evaluation. It will also help a utility manager or a water system design engineer respond to questions about the longevity of PE pipe.”
Radoszewski also explained that while PE pipe has been used in potable water situations for more than 50 years with a high satisfaction rating from the utilities that put them in place, PPI and others needed a way to test and promote the continual evolution of PE resins and the performance of those resins within pipe systems. To demonstrate and validate the long-term performance of the new resins, an accelerated testing and analysis methodology was required. The new Jana Labs report is the first time that these methodologies were recorded and published.
To no one’s surprise, the new high performance PE piping materials can provide more than 100 years of resistance to chlorine- and chloramine-treated potable water when properly designed and installed.
“The methodology we used for forecasting long-term aging shows that performance is a function of the water quality, water temperature and operating stress, all of which will vary by utility,” stated Ken Oliphant, Ph.D., PE, executive president of Jana Laboratories, Inc. “Overall, the methodology developed to project PE pipe performance shows that current generation materials are expected to have excellent longevity across the majority of end-use applications and good performance even in very aggressive end-use environments.”
The best part of the “Impact of Potable Water Disinfectants on PE Pipe” report is that PPI is offering the report for free. The link for the report is: http://www.janalab.com/pdf/disinfection.pdf.
After reading this report, consider your homework done. Just make sure you have the report handy next time you meet someone that needs to know.
Sincerely,
Tyler Henning
P.S. – Do you have an interesting job site that you would like to share? McElroy is always looking for fusion job sites where HDPE is being used and fused to solve an infrastructure problem. Contact Tyler Henning, public relations specialist at (918) 831-9286 or by email at thenning@mcelroy.com
