The monsoon sweeping different parts of the country by flood has been making rounds in the news for more than a month. Where water in excess is acting as a destructive force, the deluge situation continues to play havoc with people’s lives. Damaging valuables and properties, floods can have a tolling effect on commercial and industrial spaces by bringing businesses to a halt. Things can even take an alarming turn, with the draining effect leading to the shutdown of the companies.
Here, businesses face losses at multiple layers, taking into account the sudden discontinuity of business. At the same time, the machinery, furnishing, and miscellaneous articles in an industrial and commercial setup are very expensive. Hence, any damage to the assets levies a huge financial burden on the company, as the reconstruction and replacement of the articles can incur dual costs for reinstating the infrastructure to its original state. Therefore, instead of replacing the miscellaneous objects, timely restoration of water-damaged assets can provide a more practical and viable solution to protect the articles from any further damage.
Water Damage Restoration
In such a situation, businesses commonly seek help from insurance companies, but in the majority of cases, they end up with unbudgeted compensation due to high insurance claims. In turn, the insurance companies recommend taking help from a professional restoration team to deal with the problem. This is because, in addition to the loss, there are chances that many regulated or hazardous materials, namely arsenic, mercury, lead, asbestos, polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), pesticides, fuels, solvents, caustic chemicals, and radiological residues, might remain suspended in the water. This may raise some serious safety concerns among the occupants of the space.
Furthermore, time compounds the complexity of the situation. It acts as a determining factor in mitigating the water menace. The first 24 to 48 hours play a very critical role, portraying a paradoxical situation where one cannot resort to hasty decisions but at the same time cannot even exercise delay in taking any action. This calls for intervention by professionals who come up with a solid disaster plan to tackle the unforeseen situation. They are highly trained professionals with extensive knowledge to address the flooding effect. They come with the expertise to employ sophisticated technology and equipment to restore the structure to its original state.
The professionals employ Water Damage Restoration plan for carrying out the drying process. Here, WDR achieves the restoration of water-damaged assets while ensuring the safety of the occupants. In the entire process, it promotes the preservation, protection, and security of assets. It executes evaporation to eliminate saturated water from drywall, wood framing, and subfloors. By initiating air movement, it converts the water into vapor. In order to get effective results, evaporation is followed by dehumidification to externally exhaust and remove moisture from the air. The inability to dehumidify the space can lead to secondary and tertiary damage, which is responsible for harboring fungus, mildew, and mold, causing corrosion, and can even pose serious health hazards. Here, it is important to monitor the humidity level throughout the restoration process to amplify the drying of the materials. It is recommended to maintain the relative humidity (RH) within a very narrow range to impede the formation of disastrous combination entailing wet and moist conditions.
Unsplash/Representational image
Understanding the importance of reducing the moisture in the space, professionals make use of desiccant-based dehumidification to efficiently carry out the restoration of the assets. It offers advanced solutions to curtail the risks of condensation and impede the deterioration of materials within the space. Dehumidification efficiently removes moisture from the air. Further, for effective results, the evaporation process is accelerated by increasing the airflow, which is coupled with lowering the moisture content. Considering that warm air comes with more capacity to hold moisture as compared to cool air, a condition of high temperature in combination with low relative humidity is achieved to escalate the process of evaporation.
Here, reversing the condition can invariably delay the evaporation process. Things can turn worse, in case the relative humidity reaches 100% capacity. It induces the formation of condensation on the surface that encourages the proliferation of fungus, mold, and mildew and, at the same time, is also responsible for corrosion, decay, and other moisture-related deterioration. Therefore, maintaining the temperature at 72°F along with RH within a narrow range of 50-55% is considered ideal for obtaining optimal evaporation. Lowering the RH even more, to less than 40% can further speed up the drying process. Here, it is important to ensure that the temperature of the space is not increased throughout the WDR process.
Gauging the crucial role of drying in restoring water-damaged assets, TDS provides integrated WDR solutions with the help of desiccant dehumidifiers. By making use of high-velocity air blowers, it removes moisture for quick drying. Taking into account the vast industry knowledge, it is adept at providing professional solutions to mitigate moisture menace. It works towards minimizing interruptions in business activities and, at the same time, saves on reconstruction and replacement costs and time in large spaces.
The author Director, Technical Drying Services
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