The Lowdown on Home Water Treatment
If you're considering a home water treatment system, the options can seem overwhelming.
Your region, contamination levels, health issues, budget, and even age can all affect which system is best for you.
Here, we've done our best to compile all the info you'll need to make an informed decision.
Filter Designs: What You Should Know
You'll find water filters in many different shapes and sizes. Here are the features of the most common home water filters:
Faucet and pitcher filters are the most basic types of filtration you can get. These attach directly to your faucet or onto a pitcher.
They typically filter only chlorine and bad-tasting elements, leaving you vulnerable to the more serious contaminants in tapwater.
Countertop filters are much higher quality than faucet and pitcher filers. They typically filter out chlorine, heavy metals, organic contaminants, and hundreds of other pollutants from your water while leaving in healthy minerals like calcium and magnesium.
Countertop filters are among the easiest high-quality filters to install-most have a tube that attaches directly to your faucet.
Under sink filters hook into the plumbing beneath your sink. They can be slightly more thorough than countertop filters, because manufacturers make them in larger sizes.
The bigger the filter, the bigger the media cartridge - which improves the filtration. They also take up no space on your kitchen counter. Many people choose these filters if they have limited kitchen work space.
Shower filters attach to your showerhead and remove chlorine and some pollutants from the water you shower in.
Whole house filters are installed at the point-of-entry for all the water in your house. These are the only filters that can purify all the water you use, including dishwashing, drinking water, clothes washing, shower and bath water.
Refrigerator filters purify the water used in your ice maker. Because bacterial contaminants can sometimes get to the water in your fridge after a whole-house filter purifies it, these are good additions to a whole-house system.
Portable filters come in a few different guises. Countertop water filters generally fall into this category, as they can simply be unplugged from your home faucet and plugged into a faucet at another location. However, they can be a bit bulky, and you may not have countertop space or a faucet where you're going.
Another good option is a bottle water filter, which comes in the size of a typical water bottle. A filter attached to the underside of the lid purifies the water you pour into it. These are great for travelers, trips to the gym, or for anyone who drinks a lot of bottled water on the go.
Filtered water coolers look just like those jug water filters you often see in offices - except instead of a big jug, the cooler hooks up to your water supply and filters the water it draws from your system.
These often have hot and cold taps, just like the jug coolers. They're an easier and more economical choice for families that drink a lot of bottled water, or for office buildings that usually use jug coolers - there's no hauling, and no monthly costs to refill the jug.
Types of Filtration Media to Consider
You can buy excellent filtration - even at bargain costs. But you can't have everything in one filter - and no filter will leave your water 100% pure.
The word "media" refers to the material inside a filter cartridge that does the actual filtering. Different types of media are better at filtering different contaminants - and your most thorough filters typically have several cartridges with different types of media.
Surface area makes a big difference - bigger is always better when it comes to the media in the cartridge.
Activated carbon is one of the most common media, used in everything from faucet to whole - house filters. Carbon typically takes care of chemicals that cause your water to taste and smell bad - including chlorine, organic chemicals, some sediments, and VOC's (volatile organic compounds).
Granular carbon filtering involves a layer of tiny carbon grains, while carbon block resin is made of a porous block of carbon. Carbon block is more effective, because the flowing water won't carve paths through it and lessen its effectiveness.
Ion exchange media removes pollutants like lead, by taking on lead ions and releasing potassium ions. Ion exchange is also used to remove nitrates and fluoride from water.
The best known ion exchange systems are water softeners, which exchange calcium and magnesium for sodium. Lower-quality ion-exchange systems can leach aluminum into your water, and the presence of desirable substances like magnesium and calcium can have a negative effect on their filtering ability.
Ceramic water filters remove biological contaminants like bacteria, parasites, and cysts. The water passes through microscopic pores in the ceramic material that force these tiny pollutants out.
Over time, bacteria can grow on ceramic, actually increasing the bacterial contamination in water. That's why with cheap models, you have to boil the ceramic filter at intervals to keep it uncontaminated.
There's no need for boiling with Sterasyl - look for a high-quality ceramic filter, like the Doulton brand, that incorporates silver in the ceramic. Silver is self-sterilizing and keeps bacteria from building up.
KDF-55 is made of a copper and zinc alloy that effectively removes chlorine, heavy metal pollutants, and biological contaminants. KDF-55 can treat a high volume of water quickly, and is usually found in filters that must process fast-moving water without lowering pressure-such as shower and whole-house filters.
Chlorgon was specially invented for use in shower filters. It is extremely effective at removing chlorine and other contaminants, and at a wider temperature range than either KDF-55 or carbon filters. The best shower filters use a combination of KDF-55 and Chlorgon or activated carbon for extra-pure water.
UltraFiltration refers to a series of membranes that filter out extremely tiny biological contaminants. A high-quality UltraFiltration cartridge such as the Ster-O-Tap Membrane will filter out 99.9999999% of the smallest bacteria.
Reverse osmosis systems usually attach to the water supply under the kitchen sink. They employ a semi-permeable membrane that specializes in removal of finely dissolved sediments and the tiniest bacterial contaminants.
The system uses some water to flush contamination away from the membrane to keep it clear, which is why this system isn't usually the best choice for those living in dry regions - it wastes a lot of water for each gallon produced.
Reverse Osmosis is, however, the only filtration system on the market that can remove salt from water.
Specialized Filtration cartridges can be made of many different materials. You can find specialized cartridges designed to remove or neutralize arsenic, fluoride, or nitrates in water.
If your water is unusually high in a certain contaminant - or if someone in your house is vulnerable to certain health problems - you may need a specialized cartridge.
Age and Health Information: What You Should Filter
Healthy adults can usually get away with a water filtration system that removes the basics: chlorine disinfection by-products, heavy metals, synthetic chemicals, and cysts. At the very least, choose filters with both activated carbon and KDF-55 or ATS filtration. This is only for water that doesn't have high levels of a certain contaminant. If there is a lot of a specific pollutant in your water, you may need specialized filtration.
The categories below are more vulnerable to various contaminants in the water. People who fall under all of these categories should have baseline carbon block and KDF-55 or ATS filtration, assuming the water is without unusually high levels of a certain contaminant, but need to focus on other contaminants as well.
Children are much more vulnerable to neurological damage from overexposure to heavy metal pollutants such as lead than adults are. If there are children in your house, you should concentrate on filtering for arsenic, and lead-look for ion exchange in addition to the baseline carbon media. A shower filter is strongly recommended, because chlorine evaporates more quickly than water does - and inhaling chlorine fumes can make a child's asthma worse. Go with a filter that incorporates KDF-55 and/or Chlorgon for the best protection.
People with compromised immune systems need to be particularly on guard against bacterial infection or cysts, which grow into parasites. Look for filters that use UltraFiltration or ceramic media.
Infants and pregnant women should watch out for nitrates in the water in addition to the contaminants mentioned for children. Nitrates can cause "blue-baby syndrome," a fatal condition in infants, and also put pregnant women at risk of spontaneous abortions, stillbirths, and low birth weight. You'll need a filter that's designed specifically for nitrate filtration, because general filters don't remove it. In addition, heavy metal contaminants can permanently damage developing immune systems-so make sure you're filtering for lead, and arsenic with ion-exchange technology as well.
People at high risk of cancer should consider filtering fluoride and arsenic. Arsenic is a strong carcinogen that has been linked to many types of cancer. Fluoride is considered to be more benign by some - it's deliberately added to many municipal water systems. However, fluoride has been linked to elevated cancer risks in many of these cities. If you have cancer in the family, it's wise not to take the risk with fluoride. Look for a fluoride-specific filter - general filters are not effective at removing it - and an arsenic-specific filter.
Important disclaimer: we're not doctors. If you have a specific concern about your health and how a water filter can help protect it, talk to your doctor. He or she may be able to give you more specific advice on what to filter from your water.
The Cost Factor
They type of water filtration you need depends on your area, the industries - and history of industries - in your area, your age and health status, your contamination levels, and many more things. For most of us, budget also plays a big role, however. Here's what you can expect with a low, medium, or high budget.
Extra low budget: For under $50, you can buy a pitcher, faucet, or bottle filter. These typically come with only a carbon cartridge, and won't filter out more than chlorine and some other chemicals.
Low budget: For under $100, you can get a good - quality shower, refrigerator, or countertop water filter with a combination of carbon, Chlorgon, KDF-55 or ATS filtration.
Medium budget: For between $100 and $400, you can get a higher-end countertop or under-sink filter. You can get general filtration and specialized filtration for arsenic, fluoride, and nitrates - but the specialized filtration will be priced at the higher end of the range.
High budget: For under $1,000 you can get a whole-house filter. These are more expensive, but if you're very concerned about your water purity, they're still more economical than installing a filter on every tap - and even then you won't be able to filter your bath water, dishwasher, and clothes washer.
Before You Buy a Water Filter
Test your water with a comprehensive test kit so you know whether your water has a high level of a certain contaminant. Many pollutants, like arsenic, have no smell or taste - you won't even know your water is contaminated until you test it. Buy a comprehensive kit instead of a kit that specializes in one type of contaminant - they work just as well, they give you more information, and they're cheaper than multiple single-purpose test kits.
Click on the links or product pictures below for more information about each specific filter.
Shower Water Treatment
This is just a small sample of the shower filters we offer. If you would like to look at our entire range of shower filters, just visit our shower filter department.
Whole House Water Treatment
Drinking Water Treatment Cartridges
