Anti
Virus Water Treatment
Viruses
do not only exist in computers you know. They thrive in
the bacteria that exists in well water and many municipal
water lines. They are very small and do not necessarily
requre a cellular host to survive. And the words "thrive"
and "survive" may not be all that accurate because
there is some debate as to whether or not they are even
alive (read about the virus
life debate). But that is not the scope of this article.
What we want to do here is get rid of the nasty things!
Keeping
viruses out of your drinking and cooking water will prevent
countless illnesses and provide for peace-of-mind. There
appear to be at least three types of water treatment methods
that do not involve any type of chemical injection. While
chemical injection in most cases does work well in killing
the bacteria that act as hosts for various strains of virus,
it is very often a messy, expensive and high maintenance
method of treatment.
The
three easy methods are ultra-filtration, nano-filtration
and reverse
osmosis. Viruses are small. They are smaller than bacteria
and cannot be removed with a regular filter. The UltraFilter
(UF) can filter down to 0.1 micron which is enough to remove
the bacteria that viruses tend to reside in, but it is not
enough to remove the virus itself which can be as small
as 0.03 microns in size. The Nano-Filtration (NF) typically
filters down to 0.01 microns which is enough for even the
smallest virus.
But
by far the easiest, surest and best way to get rid of the
nasty things is through use of reverse osmosis (RO) which
is not a filter method at all (see why the reverse
osmosis membrane is NOT a filter). Easiest because it
does not involve expensive containers and monitoring equipment.
Surest because the membrane virtually does not let anything
through but water. Best because it is the least expensive
to monitor. It has the least expensive filters and elements
and it also provides great tasting drinking and food processing
water. To monitor a nano-filtration system you need to measure
the back pressure and flow rate of the filter itself. To
check the condition of an RO
membrane all you need is a simple
TDS meter. And because of the popularity of reverse
osmosis, replacement
filters and membranes are cheap and easy to find. Regular
replacement of the inexpensive pre-treatment filters ensures
long membrane life (typically 2 - 4 years).
See
all of our reverse
osmosis systems online. Be sure to check out the respective
owner's manuals for pre-treatment requirements and installation
examples.
