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Contaminants will enter liquid flows from their environment and from any prior treatment or contamination that they have undergone. The prime concern over liquid contamination now and into the foreseeable future is the provision of drinking water free of harmful bacteria and viruses, a provision that is still unavailable to vast areas of the world.

Because of the much wider range of processes involving liquids, there is a correspondingly wide range of contaminants in liquid systems, at least if defined by chemical nature. Table 1.4 shows a reasonably complete list of the techniques used
for detecting and determining the properties of solids suspended in liquids.

Applications

As has just been implied, there is a large number of contaminated liquid systems throughout industry, commerce and domestic life. Some of the more important of the working fluid decontamination processes are the:
● production of potable water from ground and surface sources
● production of ultra-pure process water
● treatment of wastewaters to prepare them for discharge
● preparation of boiler feed water and the recycling of condensate
● treatment of process wastes prior to recycle
● treatment of wash water of all kinds for re-use
● processing of transformer oils
● cleaning of machine tool coolants and cutting fluids
● cleaning of hydraulic system fluids
● treatment of all engine liquids: fuels, lubricants and coolants
● cleaning of machine lubricants.

In addition, there is a wide range of product streams that need polishing or freeing from the final bits of visual impurity – from beer to shampoo to engine oil –while most process filtration steps, in which a solid product is recovered, perhaps by
a filtration step, produce a filtrate that may need clarifying before it can be recycled or used in some other way.

The treatment of waste or surplus waters for recycling is becoming a major application as so many industrialists now try fully to ‘close their water cycle ‘. This can be seen in the paper mill, and should soon be seen on the domestic scale with
the recycle of ‘ grey water’ .

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