High purity water in a Jif

Laboratory water specialist awarded two contracts to supply equipment for the chemistry and animal and plant sciences laboratories at the University of Sheffield

Elga LabWater, the laboratory water specialist of Vivendi Water Systems, has been awarded two contracts totalling over £80,000, by main contractor NG Bailey to supply equipment for the University of Sheffield.

Both projects are being funded by the Joint Infrastructure Fund (Jif), a £750m fund launched in 1998 by the Wellcome Trust, the Office of Science and Technology and the Higher Education Funding Council (Hefce) aimed at transforming working environments and enhancing research capability in the UK academic research community.

Sheffield's new chemical biology section won a £3m Jif award which, with additional funding from Hefce and the university, has enabled it to undertake a £10m major upgrade of the 1958 Dainton Building, including two floors of laboratories, a floor of academic offices, five seminar rooms and a three hundred seat lecture theatre.

The aim of the newly created section is to increase understanding of the functional properties of biological systems at the molecular level.

The high purity water required for this work will be supplied to the seven research laboratories and five instrument rooms by a new £40,000 Elga LabWater system.

Mains water will be pre-treated by a Filtromat Junior activated carbon filter to remove chlorine and then passes to a Purelab Option E50 which uses reverse osmosis, ion exchange, photo-oxidation and electro-deionisation to produce 50 litres per hour of high purity water (5-15MW.cm resistivity) with TOC less than 20ug/l and bacteria less than 5cfu/ml.

The high purity water will be stored in a 600 litre tank and continuously recirculated round a ring main supplying the points of use.

The ring main will be equipped with an ultraviolet disinfection unit to prevent bacteria growth, with water quality being continuously assessed by a conductivity monitor linked to the department's data acquisition system.

"Elga LabWater supplied the individual units for the original building", says department superintendent Richard King, "and we were happy with the service they provided so we decided to go with them again".

Under the second contract, valued at £43,000, Elga LabWater will provide two water treatment units each consisting of a Selectron 30 softener and a Compact I reverse osmosis unit to supply 800 litres per hour permeate to the animal and plant sciences laboratories.

Again a Jif award provided the funding, this time for 32 plant culture rooms.

The study of plant metabolism and interactions with the environment requires that plants be grown in controlled conditions, and the environmental control system cost £1.5 million out of the £4 million allocated for the culture rooms.

One of the RO units will supply water for irrigation and flood benches while the other will provide direct spray injection water for humidity control.

With spray systems there is always a risk of water-borne bacteria like Legionella entering the system so the humidification circuit is fitted with a UV disinfection unit to ensure safety.

Superintendent Darren Rose was pleased the water system contract was awarded to Elga LabWater: "We know the company, we know the products and I feel happy that the health risks will be minimised.

he says.

The contracts renew a ten years old relationship between the university and Elga LabWater which, in the early 1990s, replaced many of the original glass stills in both chemistry and animal and plant sciences laboratories.

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