If you have tap water from a city source, you may want to do some research into what the municipality uses to disinfect the water. Common disinfectants include chlorides and chloramines. While these chemicals can help to disinfect the water, you may not want to have chloramines in your home’s water system.
What Is Chloramine?
To disinfect water, most city systems use chlorides as a primary disinfectant because it works quickly. To continue killing germs in the water, they often use monochloramine. This chemical comes from a combination of chlorides and ammonia.
Rarely, systems will use dichloramine or trichloramine in drinking water. Swimming pools use trichloramine more often than drinking water systems do.
What Are Effects of Chloramine in Drinking Water?
Chloramine in drinking water produces fewer regulated byproducts than chlorides does, according to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). However, that same agency acknowledges that chloramine produces more unregulated byproducts compared to chlorides. Additionally, the types of byproducts can vary on a daily basis or by the chemistry of the local water supply.
When using tap water that contains chloramine, high concentrations of this chemical can impact the integrity of copper or lead pipes. If you have lead pipes in your home for your water supply, you may consider repiping to avoid ingesting lead. Copper pipes when used with chloramine-containing water can develop tiny holes that can leak or leech copper into your water.
If you have an indoor pool or spa that uses trichloramine or dichloramine for disinfection, you may experience problems with your eyes, breathing, or skin, according to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC).
For those with home dialysis machines, you must remove chlorides and chloramines from the water before using it in the system. Leaving these chemicals in the water could lead to serious complications.
In addition to its effects on pipes and people, chloramine is toxic to fish. If you have an aquarium, you must remove the chloramine from the water before using it for your fish. Unlike chlorides that dissipates into the air if you leave the water out, chloramines require more intense removal.
How to Get Rid of Chloramine in Drinking Water
As many cities choose to integrate chloramines into their disinfection methods more, you may want to remove this chemical from your drinking water before ingesting it.
If you want to reduce the amount of chloramine in your home water system, consider incorporating our 3-micron chloramine reducing filterinto your home water filtration system. This filter can easily work with our other home water filtration systems and removes at least 85% of the chloramine from the water.
For more information about our home water filtration systems or if you want a solution to chloramines in your home’s water, contact us at Best Home Water Treatment Systems at 951.737.1500 or online.
