You Want Safe Drinking Water From Your Well
Well water filters are simply a necessity if you are among the 15% in the US who gets water from private wells.
The water from a well is not subject to municipal water treatment that your regular city water supply is subjected to. Therefore private well owners are responsible for ensuring that their residential water supply is clean and safe.
You won’t find a single water filtration unit that is designated as a “well water filter”. This is because well water purification can be accomplished by a variety of residential water treatment systems. No single water filtering device can achieve the removal of all drinking water contaminants.
Furthermore, the kind of home well water purification system one gets will largely depend on local and regional environmental factors which heavily influence the quality of well water.
Therefore, it is advisable that a well owner gets his water tested or analyzed before buying any water treatment system and do these tests routinely at least once a year.
Water testing will determine if your well water safety problems are better dealt through point-of-entry water filters (POE) like this quality whole house reverse osmosis or a point-of-use filtration system (POU), such as this counter top filter or under sink filter.
You can get your well water tested by calling the state or local environmental or health departments. Alternatively, call the EPA Safe Drinking Water Hotline at (800) 426-4791 or visit the EPA’S list of State Certification Officers for Drinking Water Laboratories
Well Water Filtration Equipment
Consider for a moment one of the most common complaints well owners have – hard water. Water hardness can destroy household appliances. Therefore, if your well water has this problem, getting a POE whole house water softener is advisable. Connect it to your outside hose, washing machine and water heater.
Of course, a water softener won’t solve the problem of contaminants in your well water. You will need to get a quality POU system to treat water for cooking, drinking or other personal uses.
This POU under counter water purifier or countertop water purifier is a powerful contaminant remover. It utilizes a combination of activated carbon, ion exchange and a sub micron filtration to aggressively remove drugs, chemicals and sediments from drinking water.
Alternatively, though more costly, you may use an under sink reverse osmosis water filter, to generate safe drinking water.
Before You Buy A Well Water Purifier
Four things to bear in mind about well water purifiers and well maintenance in general.
Firstly, installing a whole house water softener to pre-treat your well water may be extremely vital to the life of a drinking water filter. This is because hard water significantly reduces the effectiveness of a reverse osmosis filter cartridge.
Secondly, be very wary of buying a whole house reverse osmosis system (RO) to treat your well water. Not only is it expensive to both buy and operate, but the water that reverse osmosis systems produce is very aggressive.
When water treated by a RO passes through your house plumbing, it will leach lead and other dangerous contaminants from the pipes into your water. Therefore, go with a POU under counter reverse osmosis system, since it filters after the water has traveled through your plumbing, that is, at the faucet.
Thirdly, ensure that any home well water filter is NSF certified or certified to NSF standards by a reputable independent lab such as Underwriters Laboratories. This guarantees that the purification device you are buying is safe, effective and verified to perform as the manufacturer claims.
Finally, make sure your well is properly maintained. Wells in good mechanical condition are produce safer, healthier drinking water. Get an annual mechanical check up for your well from a cerifified well contractor
Recommended Action
For your health and safety, get well water filters that are NSF or state certified to be effective in removing the most harmful contaminants from your well water. These under counter filters and countertop water filters have been so certified, are inexpensive, and have been voted “Best Buy” by the Consumer Digest Magazine.
