Tuesday, May 20, 2014

What Type of Water Treatment Works Best For Rainwater?

Question for you: 

We are purchasing a home with cistern water. We have never been off of city water before. The cistern and house are both 14 years old. The house has 4 full bathrooms. There will be 6 people living there. We had coliform counts done and there were 0 cfu/ 100ml of e coli and 33 total coliform colony units.

The water is clear and odorless. The current owners have a whole house filter (coarse I believe - just the woven cylinder within a clear cylinder style) and do not add chlorine to their tank. What sort
of sterilization apparatus would you recommend. I have looked at your UV systems some. I used to work in a cell biology lab and am familiar with the UV from that perspective but not from a whole house water perspective. Thank you.


Thanks for writing to us,

An ultraviolet sterilizer works well with rainwater. UV works best if the water is clear and low in minerals and sediment. A ceramic 1 micron pre-filter ahead of the UV would remove any parasites (there is a small risk from bird droppings, squirrels perhaps). The 1 micron ceramic filter can be cleaned many times before needing to replace it, by a simple brushing of the ceramic cartridges.


Roof Washer Valve
Here are the recommended filter stages:

It is important to have a roof-washer valve set up so that the first rain washes the roof of any dust or debris. If your roof doesn’t have this already, they are inexpensive to set up. This device fills with water and after some gallons have been run to drain, it then diverts the water into the cistern .





 
Stage 1: Rusco Spin Down Stainless Steel 100 mesh flushable pre-filter (removes large sediment if any)

http://www.cleanwaterstore.com/Rusco-Spin-Down-Filter-SS-T-Style.html#item=MS007300&tab=tab1

Stage 2: Doulton Rio Ceramic Filter $236 x 2 (two are required to be installed in parallel)


http://www.cleanwaterstore.com/doulton-rio.html

OR this single Big Blue 20" non-washable 25/1 micron prefilter $149

http://www.cleanwaterstore.com/MS000050-p-filter-1-micron.html#tab=tab1

Stage 3: UV Sterilizer stainless steel 15 gpm $449

http://www.cleanwaterstore.com/UV002370-p-wonder-light-uv.html#tab=tab1

Cistern with rain washer
 Thanks for writing to us and we hope this can help solve your problem. If you have any further questions, or would like to update us on your progress - we love pictures and testimonials! - you can reach us at support@cleanwaterstore.com or on Facebook. Thanks for the letter