Abstract: A control system for automatically achieving and maintaining a desired sodium/phosphate ratio and phosphate concentration of the boiler water in an industrial boiler for minimizing corrosion. The system uses an adaptive controller that models the boiler which enables the system to predict boiler pH and phosphate concentrations at any future time given the feed rates, feed concentrations of high and low sodium/phosphate stocks, blowdown rate, mass of the boiler water, initial boiler phosphate concentration and initial pH. Once these future concentrations are determined, the controller then determines which feed rates will return the current boiler water state to, and then maintain the boiler water at, the desired sodium/phosphate congruency ratio in the least amount of time.

Abstract: Methods and apparatus are provided for using tracers to monitor industrial process equipment to which liquid is added and from which liquid is removed. In preferred embodiments, the methods are directed to detecting water leakage in a boiler in which an aqueous temperature control liquid is supplemented with feedwater at a known or unknown rate and is removed as blowdown, sootblower steam and steam at a known rate.

Abstract: Methods and apparatus are provided for using tracers to monitor industrial process equipment to which liquid is added and from which liquid is removed. In preferred embodiments, the methods are directed to detecting water leakage in a boiler in which an aqueous temperature control liquid is supplemented with feedwater at a known or unknown rate and is removed as blowdown at a known rate. The methods include determining the blowdown removal rate, adding a tracer to the temperature control liquid at a rate that is directly proportional to the blowdown removal rate, analyzing the blowdown to determine the measured concentration of tracer contained therein, deriving an expected concentration of tracer in the blowdown, and comparing the measured and expected concentrations to detect excessive variance between them.