MechChem Africa July-August 2022

⎪ Water, wastewater and pumping solutions ⎪

WearCheck acquires Set Point Water Laboratories Condition monitoring specialist company, WearCheck, has brought its sister company, Set Point Water Laboratories, into the fold adding a new division to WearCheck’s scientific testing structure. W ater analysis company, Set Point Water Laboratories i s now i ntegra ted fu l l y into WearCheck, forming

leached into thewater supply. As an example, cyanide is commonly used in gold mining and the presence of this toxinmust be constantly monitored. “Uranium is commonly found in the ore with gold and, as uranium is radioac tive, it is important to monitor the level and check whether it has leached into the water supply. This is even an issue on disusedmines andminedumps.Manyof our customers living near these come to us to test the quality of their drinking water. Chromium-6, a carcino genic element, is a by-product from chrome mines, so it is important to know if humans will be ingesting water with high levels of this substance. Health is a primary reason formany of our customers for drinking water safety, both private and in the restaurant trade formaking juices andcoffees–and theywant toknowthe hardness of theirmunicipal water as it affects their coffee machines. In addition to the above, scope water can be used for dialysis for patients who have little tonokidney function. Kidneys help com pensate for the higher intake of substances obtained from food and drinks that would otherwise build up in the body. “Dialyzing with pure water prevents the exposure of substances/toxins that cannot be eliminated from the body. We are currently doing some water quality checks for a renal unit toensure suitability for dialysis,” she says. Irrigation water quality is a critical aspect of greenhouse crop production. Water with high alkalinity can affect nutrients uptake by theplantsandcausenutrientdeficiencywhich compromises plant health, while borehole

water testing is a popular item with custom ers who want to know whether the water is safe to use in their garden, to fill the pool, and to drink and use in the household. In Cape Town, many boreholes have high salt content and, after testing the water, some customers have to dilute it with municipal water or put processes inplace to removemost of the salts. “ThroughWearCheck, our water facilities provide analytical services through an exten sivenetworkof operations inSouthAfricaand internationally and, as a result of the global Covid pandemic, we have added alcohol con tent testing to our services as well as a newly introduced logistics solution to enable easy movement of water and sanitiser samples,” Horsfield adds. www.setpointwaterlaboratories.co.za

yet another area of expertise along with WearCheck’s other services, which include scientific used oil analysis, asset reliability care, transformer oil testing and lubricant enabled reliability services. ISO 17025:2017-accredited Set Point Water Laboratories tests water from any source – ranging from drinking water to fac tory effluent, and everything in between – to determine the presence and levels of poten tially harmful substances. The company was es tab l i shed i n Johannesburg in 1998 as a minerals labora tory, then known as Set Point Laboratories. Water testing was introduced in 2013 and expanded with the launch of a Cape Town water laboratory in 2019, which was accred ited in 2020 and thereafter focused only on water analysis. Thelma Horsfield, general manager of Set PointWater Labs, outlines their services: “Our laboratory technicians select the relevant tests for a water sample depending on the needs of the customer. They identify what is wrong with the water and advise customers onpossible consequences of using or discard ing such water. “Water analysis is conductedusing various accredited techniques such as photometric, electrometric, colorimetric, gravimetric, ICP OES, ICP MS and enzyme substrates. These techniques obtain thebest possible results for chemical and microbial analysis of effluent/ wastewater, drinkingwater, processedwater, surface water and groundwater. “In the case of industrial operations needing to dispose of wastewater into a river system, the sea or simply down the drain, there are strict by-laws that must be adhered to, outlining the acceptable levels of contaminants before disposal to prevent possible fines or even prosecution. Our wa ter technicians determine the exact levels of contaminants and advise on acceptable levels for safe discarding. “Many of our mining customers operate boreholes, using this water in the mining process. We regularly monitor the water quality from the boreholes to test whether contaminants from the mining process have

Senior laboratory assistant, Katego Mokoroane, prepares water samples to determine contamination levels at WearCheck’s Water Laboratory in Johannesburg.

Water lab assistant, Andisiwe Gwavu, checking balances in WearCheck’s Water Laboratory in Cape Town.

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