Water Filters vs Water Softeners
With drinking water in the news often lately, residents all over the United States are talking about the quality and safety
of their public drinking water supplies. From lead in drinking water in Michigan to water scarcity problems in California, water treatment systems are a popular and important part of any home these days. Whether you want to soften your water or filter it, you’re making a huge impact on your family’s health and your home’s water.
Many people hear water treatment and are unsure of the difference between a water filter and a water softener. They also want to know which would be better to have in their household. In California, the majority of residents deal with hard water issues on a daily basis and could benefit from softened water. Just having a basic understanding of each type of water system can help you to make an informed decision about improving and maintaining the quality of your tap water. Luckily, a recent article from Free Drinking Water and APEC gives you just that – helpful, easy-to-understand information about the most common kinds of residential water treatment systems.
A water softener treats hard water by utilizing salt and ion exchange technology to remove minerals that leave hard water stains on your dishes and shower walls and create problems with pipes and appliances due to the limescale buildup it leaves behind. Within the water softeners, resins are coated in a sodium solution and when hard water comes into contact with the resin beads, the calcium and magnesium ions migrate out of the solution to the active sites on the resin and are replaced in the solution by sodium ions.
A water filter like an RO system will not remove hard minerals but rather contaminants like bacteria, pollutants, microbes, metals and chemicals. They can include small RO drinking water systems and also large whole house water filters which treat water throughout the entire home. These filters use a wide variety of water purification technologies to treat water contamination.
Water softeners are excellent water treatment systems that will protect your home from the harmful effects of hard water scale buildup. Likewise, water filters are effective when it comes to other harmful contaminants. Let our water technicians test your water and help you decide which water system would be best for your household.
