Boiler Blog | Nationwide Boiler Inc.

Located in Lathrop, CA, the Discovery ChalleNGe Academy is a Community High School run by the California National Guard in partnership with the San Joaquin County Office of Education. Part of the National Guard Youth ChalleNGe Program (NGYCP), the Academy was founded in 1993 to assist students in enhancing life skills, education levels, and employment potential.  This military-style program houses, feeds, and educates 16 to 18-year-old young adults that were unable to complete high school due to varying unfortunate circumstances. The program allows students to earn 65 High School credits while developing leadership, job, and academic skills, while improving self-esteem, pride, and confidence.  

With the school year coming to an end and graduation quickly approaching, The Academy set up a trip for a group of students working to complete their high school credits, and Nationwide Boiler was honored to participate. The goal of this field trip was to educate the graduating class on the many different education, trade, and career opportunities available to them once they step out into the real world.

The first stop of the day was San Jose State University, where they toured the campus and the new $130M recreation center. After experiencing lunch like a college student in the Student Union, they headed north to Nationwide’s shop in Fremont. Upon arrival, the students congregated on the patio to hear a warm welcome from President & CEO, Larry Day, and Vice President, Michele Tomas. The group was then taken on a tour of our 26,000 sq. ft. shop, where day-to-day activities include; boiler maintenance, welding, painting, electrical work, fabrication, equipment assembling, and other technical skills.

Nationwide Boiler’s Shop & Service Managers, Andrew Horne and Michael Rosmando, educated the students on the basics of a boiler system, and walked them through the different trade skills and career opportunities available not just here at Nationwide, but from other companies in similar and varying industries. Many of the students were interested in welding, electrical, and accounting careers. Who knows… we may have just met future Nationwide employees!

At Nationwide Boiler, we feel strongly about training and educating our youth so that we are able to successfully sustain our business and industry for future generations, and we are happy to have had the opportunity to be a part of this inspiring program. Thank you to Todd Robinson and the NGYCP for providing young adults with an opportunity that will help them secure their futures.

The tournament began on Wednesday, May 8th with a practice round of golf and scramble competition at the Poppy Hills Golf Course. Guests worked up an appetite for our traditional Clam Bake Buffet that evening, where we raffled off an ounce of gold to the lucky winners, Scott & Carol Sanders from HTS. We also announced the winning foursome from the scramble, which included Grant Carter & Jack Oliver from ADCO Companies, and Jon Craig & Nick Kammeyer from C&C Boiler, two of our long-time representative companies. 

Tournament play began bright and early the next day at the renowned Pebble Beach Golf Links. Guests participated in several fundraising activities both during the round of golf and that evening at the awards ceremony & banquet. These activities included mulligan sales, best ball competitions, a unique card raffle game, and silent and open auction events. Upon conclusion of our Roaring Twenties theme banquet, the following tournament winners were announced:

• Jack Oliver, Longest Drive
• Christian Neal, Callaway Division Champion
• Grant Carter, Handicap Division
• Jordan Bliss, Low Gross Champion & Closest to the Pin

Congratulations to the winners and thank you again to all of our tournament sponsors and donors. Be sure to save the date for the 40th Anniversary of Nationwide Boiler’s Annual Charity Golf Tournament, scheduled for May 6-7, 2020.

Remember, giving is not just about making a donation, it’s about making a difference. We intend on continuing our tradition of giving back to charitable causes like Make-A-Wish® and the Randy Rawson Scholarship Fund for many years to come.

With air emission regulations constantly changing, Nationwide Boiler has had to adopt new ways to keep up with more stringent standards. For instance, in 1995, Nationwide became the first rental boiler company to convert their fleet of watertube boilers to low NOx levels of 30 ppm. The company’s method of choice to reduce NOx emissions further led to the creation of the CataStak™, which was developed in the late 90s and since then has proven to reduce NOx emissions by as much as 99%. In addition, it can be supplied for new equipment or as a retrofit on an existing system. What were the early days of the CataStak like? What steps did it take to get to where it is now? Let’s find out in this edition of Boiler Basics 101.

It all began when Nationwide Boiler chose Selective Catalytic Reduction, or SCR technology, to be their solution to NOx compliance. They determined that SCR was the best alternative due to its reliability, ease of operation, high efficiency, and its ability to reduce emissions to single digit NOx levels. In 1999, Nationwide Boiler became the first rental boiler company to conduct an SCR field demonstration on a package watertube boiler and followed by utilizing the system heavily in their rental fleet. The enormous success of rental SCR systems suggested to company management that a market existed for a field-retrofit system for package boilers - later to be branded and trademarked in 2001 as the CataStak™ SCR System.

Fast forward to the year 2004, Nationwide began offering the CataStak for new and existing package watertube boilers to meet sub 9 ppm NOx levels. After witnessing its continual growth, Nationwide Boiler introduced a new business unit, Nationwide Environmental Solutions (NES). NES was formed with a focus on lowering overall industrial greenhouse gas emissions and increasing the operational efficiency of fired equipment. This allowed Nationwide to continually raise the bar in providing reliable solutions to meet market demand.

Nationwide later developed the urea-based CataStak as a solution for customers adverse to the stringent handling requirements of ammonia. The system utilizes common diesel exhaust fluid (DEF), a safe and readily available 32.5% liquid urea solution. It was first demonstrated on a package firetube boiler in 2011 and has since been expanded to be utilized on watertube boilers and other fired equipment. Initially, the system was offered only for permanent applications but in 2018, Nationwide became the first rental boiler supplier to provide urea-based SCR systems on a boiler rental project. The company now has a fleet of urea-based SCR systems to support the rental market.

The CataStak has come a long way and has now been installed in over 180 applications. These installations range from temporary to permanent package boilers, fired heaters, gas turbines, and heat recovery steam generators. With all of these accomplishments, the CataStak has become the standard for compliance assurance, reliability and product quality. CataStak SCR systems lead the industry with the best track record in terms of performance, and source test results often exceed current local, regional and national emissions requirements.

If you’re interested in learning more about the CataStak, our website has all the details you need to get started. And be sure to check out the previous and future Boiler Basics 101 blogs to continue learning about various boiler-related topics.

With the COVID-19 pandemic upon us, there has been a lot of talk about essential businesses. What is it that actually deems a business essential? In short, businesses that people rely on in everyday life are essential, while nonessential businesses are generally recreational in nature.

Many consumers may not understand the necessity of steam in everyday life, however, steam plays a major role in many industries including hospitals, food processing, refineries, and pulp and paper manufacturing. Let’s dive into exactly how steam is used in some of these processes.

Hospitals
One of the most obvious groups of essential workers right now are those in a hospital, and steam is utilized extensively in all hospital settings. There are five major uses of steam in a hospital: comfort heating, humidification of air, sterilization of surgical instruments and medical waste, laundry, and food preparation.  

Food Processing
Steam used by food processors commonly falls into two distinct categories: Clean Steam or Utility Steam. Clean Steam, also known as “sanitary” or “culinary” steam, is typically used for direct injection into a product or to clean and sterilize product contact surfaces. Utility Steam, also referred to as “plant” steam, can be used in most applications that do not involve direct contact with food products or the surfaces that the food might contact. It is often utilized to supply energy for heating, cooking, or mechanical work. 

Some other examples of where steam is typically utilized in food processing is the tomato canning process, deodorizing cocoa butter, puffing up cereal, and sanitization of yogurt cups.

Electricity Generation
Most of the electricity generated in the United States is from electric power plants that use a turbine to drive electricity generators, and many of these turbines are driven by steam. Steam turbines use high-pressure steam to rotate the blades of a turbine and create mechanical or rotational energy. As the steam turbine spins, the generator spins and creates electricity.

Pulp & Paper
Steam is used heavily in the production of paper products because energy drives the papermaking process. In fact, it is estimated nationally that steam accounts for approximately 43% of the total energy demand at a paper facility.

Most paper mills have a steam turbine to generate electricity. Steam is also used to cook wood chips and cook fibers for improved sheet strength, to evaporate moisture from pulp, to heat rotating dryer drums to dry the paper stock, and to heat chemicals for other processes. The steam from a boiler is also commonly used in other locations of the mill, like heat exchangers, steam-traced piping, and stock chests. Due to its usefulness, steam is the primary input used to evaporate moisture from a sheet, allowing for desirable and profitable sheet characteristics to be created.

Petroleum Refining
Petroleum refining is an energy-intensive process, with energy accounting for approximately 50% of refining costs. Steam is used in many ways in a refinery and is necessary to keep plants running.  Some uses include:

•   - Steam turbines for electricity generation and running pumps and compressors.
•   - Steam tracing and jacketing to keep viscous processes fluid in pipes.
•   - As a heating source to break up oils and distribute for the manufacturing of different products.
•   - As a heating source for lube oil systems for large pieces of equipment.
•   - As a heating source for reboilers.
•   - Plant cleanup.
•   - Stripper column injection to aid in stripping separation of different processes.
•   - Minor leak suppression by use of steam lances.
•   - Steam flares to aid in complete combustion of processes.

Chemical Processing
Steam also plays a large role in chemical processing and is used as both a process fluid and a utility. Common uses include process heating, power generation, atomization, cleaning and sterilization, moisturization, and humidification. Because it is so versatile, there are some major advantages to using steam in chemical processing:

• Control. By controlling the pressure of steam, you can control the temperature at which the heat is released. Having good control over the temperature is necessary in a number of chemical processes.
• Efficiency. Steam is an efficient heat source because it has a high output per mass of utility at a constant temperature.
• Safety. It is non-flammable, non-toxic, and inert to several process fluids.

Although steam is often hidden from our daily lives, it is the most effective way to transfer heat or energy and offers unique features that you just cannot duplicate with other systems. The simplicity and adaptability of steam makes it a reliable medium and first choice for many processing operations.

Nationwide Boiler takes pride in supporting many essential businesses with a reliable source of steam, whether for temporary or permanent use. As our own Walter Heussmann put it, “The heartbeat of America is driven by steam. The power industry, oil and gas, chemical, hospitals, food and beverage…. We are here to keep America going.”