July 2010

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An email extension of the Pure Water Gazette.

In this hot July issue you'll hear about ways to raise the pH of acidic waters and learn why shampoo and chloramines don't mix. You'll hear about the clam problem in Lake Tahoe and the banning of submersible pumps in Texas lakes. Tube wells in Bangladesh and a scary dead zone in the Gulf. Hear important news about "Change Your Refrigerator Water Filter month." Learn the hazards of turning tap water into holy water and falsifying water tests. You will meet Pure Water Annie who will tell you about calcite, Corosex, soda ash and caustic soda. You'll learn about the very complex history of oysters and hear a young man's scheme to turn household waste water into electricity. Then there's a new leak protector from Watts and a really striking photo of a peristaltic metering pump. Hear about Atrazine, a new devastating oil leak in the Kalamazoo River and, as always, much, much more. The Pure Water Occasional is edited by Pure Water Gazette Editor Hardly Waite.

Water News from Around the World

While you were fanning yourself and trying to stay cool, a lot of important things happened during July. Follow the links if you want to read more.

A young British student has invented a simple and inexpensive chlorination device to provide low cost water treatment for rural India without electricity.

A Korean medical professor who invented a device to turn tap water into holy water is facing fraud charges. 

Whilrpool Corporation has declared July “Change Your Refrigerator Water Filter Month", a twice a year campaign that is carried out, according to Whirlpool, “for Consumers’ well-being and wealth.”  We have decided to declare August “Buy Something Really, Really Expensive from Pure Water Products Month." This campaign is being carried out to fight terrorism, global warming, and the clubbing of baby seals.

It was reported that nitrates in water may increase throat cancer in women. 

Certain ingredients in shampoo, detergents and other household cleaning agents can combine with the chloramines in tap water to form cancer causing chemical agents.

In California, storage tanks from 55 gas stations are leaking gasoline, diesel, and MTBE into the water supply.  Station owners are reluctant to fix the problem, so the impoverished state government is allocating cleanup funds.

Between 35 and 77 million Bangladeshis have been exposed to toxic levels of arsenic from drinking contaminated water, a public health calamity causing one in five deaths in the country, according to new research published in The Lancet medical journal.

While the BP oil spill has been labeled the worst environmental catastrophe in recent U.S. history, a biofuel is contributing to a Gulf of Mexico "dead zone" the size of New Jersey that scientists say could be every bit as harmful to the Gulf.

Scuba-diving scientists have carpeted the bottom of Lake Tahoe in an effort to halt the invasion of unwelcome Asian clams.

A water treatment salesman in ME was convicted of mail fraud for falsely reporting a water test result.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has banned the use of  submersible pumps in many Texas Lakes. 

Several small water systems in the Laramine WY area are experiencing unsafe levels of nitrates that are blamed on leaching of urine from septic systems. 

An estimated 76 million pounds of Atrazine are sprayed on corn and other field crops in the U.S. each year, Much of this ends up in rivers, streams, and drinking water supplies, yet the pesticide manufacturer is apparently being allowed to determine the chemical's safety. 

A British industrial design student has created a system that transforms household wastewater to electricity.

San Diego County lowered water consumption 13% during the last physical year.  Higher rates, threats of fines, and a growing conservation ethic all contributed. 

American Water has donated $193 million to the international water charity Water for People.

Pollution makes a full ¼ of China’s water supply unusable and there is no hope for improvement in sight.

A 30” pipeline rupture leaked almost a million gallons of oil into the Kalamazoo River. The incident went almost unnoticed in the national press.

Pure Water Products is giving away some water filters. We have a few Aquasana countertops, exactly like these. The Aquasanas are brand new, they are free for the asking, and we pay shipping. One to a customer. Please use this email link to request one.

Raising the pH of acidic water

By

Pure Water Annie

Let’s be clear.  This article is not about “ionizers” or similarly misnamed consumer gadgets that magically amend the pH of water and contribute to the health, wealth, and happiness of the seller.

It is about the standard strategies used by water treatment professionals to raise the pH of acidic waters, most often well water, for aesthetic improvement, the protection of plumbing fixtures, or to assist in other water treatment procedures such as the removal of iron and manganese.

Two standard techniques are used:  filtration and injection.

Filtration involves sending the water to be treated through a bed of a granular sacrificial medium which dissolves slowly and adds calcium carbonate to the water, thus buffering the acidity and raising the pH.  The most commonly used medium for this process is calcite—a natural granular substance that provides a relatively mild upward bump in pH.  Calcite is sometimes mixed with a small amount of another standard medium called Corosex which has a stronger effect on increasing pH. 

At right, a backwashing calcite filter. The domed hole near the top allows the sacrificial medium to be added.
At right, a peristaltic metering pump to deliver a soda ash solution to raise the pH of acidic water.

Most filters for acid neutralization are backwashing filters, like the one pictured, but if the water is very clean—such as in post-treatment for large reverse osmosis units—in/out style upflow filters can be used.  (Calcite is also available in cartridge form for post treatment for undersink reverse osmosis units.)

The only disadvantage of calcite treatment is that it raises the hardness of the treated water slightly.  This is of no concern unless the water being treated is already very hard.

The second standard pH increase strategy is injection of a small amount of a pH increasing substance. 

Soda Ash is the most commonly used pH increaser, but a product called caustic soda, which is about a 30% stronger pH increaser, is sometimes preferred, especially in swimming pool treatment. 

Soda ash is delivered via a small injection pump, usually electric, that injects a solution of the product under pressure into the water line. 

The advantage of injection of soda ash is that it does not add to hardness and it gives a more potent increase in pH.  It can be used to treat water in the 5.0 range, whereas calcite filtration does not give sufficient increase to very acidic water.

Currently featured (among a few hundred other pieces) in the Pure Water Gazette: The Complicated History of Oysters," from the Food Safety News.

Write to the Editor.

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