Addenbrooke’s Hospital

Addenbrooke’s Hospital is one of the largest medical centers in the UK. The hospital has more than 1,000 beds and is administrated by Cambridge University Hospital. The Addenbrookes’ moved to its present location in the southern area of Cambridge in 1976.

The hospital’s engineering group was troubled by issued regarding corrosion in its domestic hot water systems covering Building C and D. In 2001, the engineers had to replace the pipes with those of galvanized steel.

However, iron-ions kept dissolving, and single-cell bacteria thrived in the water. There were frequent water leaks as well as discolored water coming out of faucets every morning.

To address those severe issues, the hospital installed two Pipetector; one on the main tap water supply pipe and the other on the outlet pipes of hot water tanks in which the water is mixed with the hot water to mee the optimal temperature.

The hospital then sampled water from a third-floor water tap in February and April 2004 and sent them directly to Anglian Water Services Ltd. for testing of their iron-ion content.

Only after 66 days, the content was reduced from 1.07 mg/ℓ to 0.11 mg/ℓ. This indicates Pipetector immediately stopped the chemical reaction to form corrosion inside the pipes.

Being used continuously, Pipetector will reduce the existing corrosion to magnetite, a firm substance that does not dissolve in water, and protect inside the piping from further corrosion deterioration.

15 years after two Pipetector units were adopted to the hospital, the water was sampled once more from the main domestic hot water system as a follow-up survey on Jan. 16, 2019 and sent directly to Chemtest Ltd for analysis.

As shown below, Pipetector still demonstrated its anti-corrosion effect as the level of iron-ion content was kept at 0.18 mg/ℓ.

This proves the NMR technology is still providing complete protection against internal corrosion even 15 years later.