Ion-exchange Piping Materials

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Abstract

Oonce upon a time drinking water was conveyed in hollowed out tree trunks (1). As late as 1934, large diameter wooden staved pipes of redwood and Douglas fir could still be seen carrying water through the hillsides to remote populated areas in the United States (2). At the same time, choices for connections to homes wandered from lead pipes to galvanized iron to copper, and even some plastics. It is surprising to note that as recent as 2007 that Providence Water in Rhode Island reported that some 23,000 of its connections were still using lead pipes (3). A similar evolution, but on a faster pace, can be presented in the conveyance of water used in the high tech industries; be they the production of microchips, flat panel displays, photovoltaic cells, LEDs, biotech, or pharmaceutical applications. The biotech industry, for example, recognized that metals, a life science material of choice, within their high-purity water would shutdown vital enzymatic synthesis processes (4). And, early wafer fabs still used stainless steel to convey some process waters up until the late 1980s (5). That is to say, once upon a time piping system materials that are undesirable today dominated early high tech production installations.

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