Large Fluctuations in the Amount of Bacteria in Your Industrial Water?

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Large Fluctuations in the Amount of Bacteria in Your Industrial Water?

According to our experience, it happens quite often to observe large and unexpected fluctuations in the amount of bacteria detected in industrial waters.

The same happens also in piping systems transporting other liquids and it happens whatever the method is used to detect bacteria in the samples of liquid.

What you observe is something like this:

The first thought is that there is something wrong with the feed water, since the bacteria are expected to arrive mainly with the water:

This underestimates the importance of bacterial growth on the internal surfaces of the piping system ("biofilm"). Even when the feed water contains few bacteria (and even when such water is filtered), the few microorganisms entering in the piping system can settle on the surfaces in contact with the liquid. Then they start duplicating, giving rise to a bacterial layer than can host many more bacteria than those free in the water. Once the biofilm is mature, parts of it detach and flow away, transported by the water:

In many cases this phenomenon explains the mentioned fluctuations in the amount of bacteria in the water:

This underlines why water sampling and analysis is not enough, to prevent bacterial contamination and related issues. 

Biofilm monitoring should be applied, to have an early warning about possible problems. 

Read more or contact us at info@alvim.it  for any additional information.

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