Cooling water systems: An overview

There are two basic types of cooling water systems and a wide variety of variations depending upon the industry these systems service. The size, complexity, and service stresses present in each type of system can also be industry specific. The basic premise of a cooling water system is to remove heat energy from a hot process and transfer it to the environment using water as the heat transfer medium. The heat transfer to the environment is completed where water is cooled in a cooling tower (mainly through partial evaporation) and from the process to the water in heat exchangers with a “shell and tube” design being the most common form.