At Houston Water Solutions, our goal is to make sure you get the right water treatment for your home’s exact needs. We offer a number of different solutions in both water filtration and water conditioning. First, however, let’s cover the two common water challenges and how Houston Water Solutions can help you with each.
Issue No. 1: Hard Water
Hard water remains a big problem in the Southwest United States, and especially in Houston, where levels have averaged 8 grains per gallon (gpg) – considered “hard,” by the Water Quality Association. Because it contains calcium and magnesium deposits, hard water can do a lot of damage over time to:
- Water-based appliances (making them use more energy)
- Pipes (clogging them and creating limescale buildup)
- Sinks, faucets, and drains (leaving ugly scaling behind)
- Your skin (causing skin dryness and even cracking)
- And even your hair (making it feel dry, dull, and lifeless.)
Hard water can also make your water taste unpleasant leaving a metallic or chalky aftertaste.
Solution to No. 1: Whole-Home Water Conditioning
The process of water conditioning removes those pesky calcium and magnesium deposits from your water, making it softer. (Hence, it’s also called water softening.) Typically, because hard water affects the entire house, most water conditioning systems focus on softening your water from a whole-home perspective. Houston Water Solutions offers four options here:
- 100 Series (Option 1): Uses a BlackCat® Ion Exchange Resin filter to remove calcium, lime, magnesium and iron from your water.
- 200 Series (Option 2): Along with the BlackCat® Ion Exchange Resin filter, the 200 Series includes a High-Capacity Coconut Shell Activated Carbon filter to provide an extra layer of filtration that removes chlorine and unpleasant tastes/odors from your water.
- 700 Series (Option 3): The 700 series purifies water with a 7-stage filtration process. In addition to the BlackCat® Ion Exchange Resin filter and the High-Capacity Coconut Shell Activated Carbon filter, the 700 series also includes 5 additional filters:
- Bone Char Carbon Filter: Which removes fluoride, arsenic, lead, radioactive chemicals, and more.
- Catalytic Carbon Filter: Which removes chloramine and hydrogen sulfide.
- KDF-55 Filter: Which removes lead, mercury, chromium, dissolved metals, bacteria, fungi and more.
- NextSand Filter: A rare natural mineral with a filtration performance of 3.5 microns removal.
- Gravel Media Filter: Which ensures particles don’t migrate into the purified water.
- Pentair Pro Elite (Option 4): The ultimate whole-home water conditioning system, the Pro Elite includes the 7-stage filtration of the 700 series, but also contains a patented technology making it the most efficient system for water and electricity usage. It also comes with a lifetime warranty.
Issue No. 2: Water Contaminants
According to a recent analysis by the Environmental Working Group, Houston water was found to have the presence of 13 contaminants that exceeded its safety guidelines, including excessive amounts of arsenic, chloroform, and radium. Another study found that Harris County had a total of 1,330 drinking water violations reported from its 1,228 active facilities. We recently wrote about the contaminants found in Houston’s water, as well as specifically detailed the evidence of harmful elements such as lead and PFAS. Contamination in the form of these water-borne particles can be dangerous to you and negatively impact the health of everyone living in your household.
Solution to Issue No. 2: Point-of-Use Reverse Osmosis Water Filtration
Reverse osmosis (RO) is a water purification process, which uses a partially permeable membrane to separate contaminants, unwanted molecules and other particles from drinking water. It works in the following way: Pressure forces the unfiltered water (a.k.a. “feed water”) through this semipermeable membrane, filtering out the particles and creating clean drinking water.
In most cases, a total RO system is actually made up 3 or 4 different levels of filtration (including one reverse-osmosis-specific filter) and may include a number of steps:
- A sediment filter that traps particles, including rust and calcium carbonate
- A second sediment filter with even smaller pores
- An activated carbon filter to trap organic chemicals and chlorine
- A reverse osmosis filter
- An ultraviolet lamp that may be used for sterilizing any microbes that may escape filtering by the reverse osmosis membrane
- A second carbon filter to capture those chemicals not removed by the above processes.
Reverse osmosis systems can be integrated into whole-home solutions but often are applied at the point where your water comes out or what’s known as point-of-use. Most households employ reverse osmosis filtration systems under the kitchen sink to purify the water there so it’s clean for drinking. At Houston Water Solutions, we use Pentair’s FreshPoint Reverse Osmosis filters (Option 5), which will remove all major contaminants including lead, PFAS, arsenic, and more, leaving you with clean, great-tasting water.
Conclusion
We hope this article has been helpful. If you’re interested in learning more, why not get a free water quality analysis with us? We’ll send a technician to your home to test your water for contaminants and hard water particles, get you the results fast and then recommend the right solution for you. It’s that easy. Contact us today!