EMERSON
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Steam Traps

Yarway™ steam traps provide reliable operation suitable for a wide range of applications with option monitoring to minimize steam loss.

What are Steam Traps?

Steam traps are self-actuated valves used to release condensate and air from steam distribution systems without allowing the passage of steam. Due to a wide range of process requirements, steam traps come in a variety of technologies, each with their own advantages and trade-offs. Steam traps play a large role in optimizing plant efficiency and environmental emissions, increasing the criticality when sizing and selecting the ideal steam trap for each application.

Steam Trap Selection Guide

Stream Trap Selection Guide

Reliable Solutions for Steam Generation & Distribution Applications

Reliable Solutions for Steam Generation and Distribution Applications

Learn more about Steam Traps

Steam Trap Survey Reduces Plant Energy Costs

Steam Trap Survey Reduces Plant Energy Costs

A steam trap survey conducted at a large petrochemical plant led to the replacement of 1200 failed traps and annual energy cost savings of $960K.

Steam Trap Animations

Steam traps, boiler trim valves, level gauges, and other reliable steam solutions.

Optimizing Steam Trap Energy Management
WEBINAR

Optimizing Steam Trap Energy Management

Discover how to reduce energy waste by ensuring proper steam trap performance using Emerson Connected Services, which offers maintenance personnel access to third-party experts who monitor traps, analyze data, and help immediately identify failures.

FAQs

Steam traps are analogous to motor vehicles in that each has a single underlying purpose but is available in a wide variety of models and options. Selecting the correct model depends on user needs and preferences. In selecting the right trap a user must think hard about the priority of his needs. While efficiency and reliability may seem obvious requirements, other criteria (such as responsiveness to changing pressures and condensate flow rates, installation flexibility, ease of maintenance, and troubleshooting) are more judgmental. When all of these issues are considered, steam trap selection becomes a matter requiring thoughtful evaluation. At the least, a wrong selection means a savings opportunity missed; – at the worst, it can mean a costly disruption of production.

Industrial steam traps can be divided into two major groups: (1) traps designed for draining process equipment such as tire presses, drying rolls, air heaters, and heat exchangers (often referred to as process traps); (2) traps designed for draining steam mains or tracing systems. The latter serve as a protection function and are sometimes referred to as protection traps. Protection services, such as steam main drips and tracer heating, are by a wide margin the most common trap application. They generally see very light condensate loads, often less than 50 pounds per hour. Process traps are generally designed for condensate loads of several hundred pounds per hour to several thousand pounds per hour.

The three types are:

  • Thermodynamic traps: traps that are actuated by the principles of thermodynamics and fluid dynamics.
  • Mechanical traps: traps that are actuated by a float, responding to changes in condensate level.
  • Thermostatic traps: traps that are actuated by temperature-sensitive devices, responding to changes in condensate temperature.