Effective volatile organic compound removal, otherwise known as VOC removal, is a necessary component of industry and manufacturing. VOCs are chemicals (such as benzene, vinyl chloride) that when at room temperature, can evaporate into potentially toxic gases. Government regulations typically limit the quantity of VOCs that are emitted from manufacturing or industrial facilities, or construction and remediation sites. Treatment of these volatile organic compounds (VOC removal) is not only beneficial to human health (long term exposure has been linked to certain cancers), but it is most often mandated by law.
One method of mitigating VOCs or VOC removal is through the use of cooling towers. Essentially what a cooling tower does is safely remove waste heat from a manufacturing or industrial facility and transfer it into the atmosphere. Types of cooling tower systems include water cooling towers, evaporative cooling towers, and closed loop cooling systems, and are most often employed in oil refineries, petrochemical and other chemical plants, thermal power stations, and HVAC systems for cooling buildings.
In these types of VOC removal systems, the evaporation of water is used to removed heat and cool the waste. Because of the corrosive nature of VOC removal, a cooling tower manufacturer may construct their systems out of corrosion proof plastic as opposed to metal that could rust, flake, chip, et cetera.