To our knowledge, Michelle, in the retail world filters using activate carbon have the ability to effectively reduce levels of trihalomethanes in water. Many RO systems come with activated carbon pre- or post-filters as an add-on or option so if your filter has one such filter as an option, then yes, your reverse osmosis system which includes some sort of activate carbon filter should work for trihalomethane reduction.

As far as test kits go, you will need to have your water tested by a laboratory since no at-home DIY water test kits for trihalomethanes exists. You can choose to use a local laboratory or a mail-in service like National Testing Laboratories.

Removal vs. reduction?

You may have noticed that we spoke of REDUCING trihalomethane levels rather than eliminating them altogether. We did so because in the world of water processing and filtration, although many filtration methods do an excellent job of taking unwanted contaminants out of water, current analytical tools only allow us to measure down to certain concentrations... and so the possibility exits that lower levels of the contaminants MAY still exist in treated/filtered water.

Does all public water contain trihalomethanes?

If your public water system uses 'free chlorine' as its primary disinfectant, then yes, your water system distributes drinking water that contains trihalomethanes.  Keep in mind, though, that the EPA has set what it considers safe limits for the amount of trihalomethanes that public water treatment facilities may distribute so in all likelihood your water does not contain levels of trihalomethanes currently deemed as harmful to humans.

Water distributed by water treatment facilities that use chloramines as the primary disinfectant does not typically contain harmful levels of trihalomethanes.  You should know, though, that at least one a year most chloramine systems do flush their lines with water containing free chlorine as part of a cleansing protocol to get rid of any accumulated 'line slime' that chloraminated water did not keep at bay.

Free chlorine vs. total chlorine?  Which do I have?

To determine what primary disinfectant your water supplier uses, you can usually pick up the phone and ask them or you can use a basic water test like the WaterWorks 2 Free & Total Chlorine test strip to find out for yourself.  The WaterWorks 2 product detects free chlorine levels and total chlorine levels at the same time and if you subtract the free chlorine level from the total chlorine level...  In most cases if the total chlorine test pad give a reading, and the free chlorine test pad does not, then your water system more than likely uses chloramination to keep the water safe.

Looking for reverse osmosis water filters?

Remember:  Reverse osmosis on its own cannot effectively reduce potentially harmful levels of trihalomethanes so if your water quality goals include reducing trihalomethane levels in your water, we suggest you consider water filtration systems featuring pre and/or post-filters that contain Granular Activated Carbon (often abbreviated as GAC). You can find a number of different filter brands and types on the following sites: FilterWater.Com, FiltersFast.Com and Filter-Drinking-Water.Com.

Sounds like it would make sense that treated, filtered water dispensed (sold) by a municipality or privatized water company would not contain potentially harmful levels of dissolved metals… but in reality they only have to make certain water they produce does not contain dissolved metals at the point where it leaves their facilities.

Between those facilities and the faucets of households on water systems lie vast networks of metal piping that can very easily leach small amounts of metals into the water supply… or worse, yet, leach potentially harmful amounts of lead, copper, iron, etc. into the water supply.

Oh, and if you live in a building or home built before the advent of builders using plastic (i.e. PVC) piping, well, that means you have metal plumbing in your home which could, in many cases, result in your water containing elevated levels of metals — especially if you also if you have problems with corrosive water and/or have water sitting in your lines for long periods of time (i.e. in the plumbing of vacation homes or lines connected to faucets/showers/etc. that do not get used on a regular basis).

Reducing and removing metals from drinking water?

Not all water filters will remove or reduce dissolved metals in water as efficiently and some water filters, despite the claims on their packaging, don’t really do a good job of removing metals at all.

As a general rule, one should NOT rely on faucet filters, shower filters, or other small point-of-use devices to keep them safe from water metals.

For the average homeowner we suggest looking at reverse osmosis water filters since they offer excellent filtration on their own for unwanted drinking water contaminants like metal ions & aqueous salts including sodium, chloride, copper, chromium, and lead. Additionally, reverse osmosis units typically also reduce arsenic, fluoride, radium, sulfate, calcium, magnesium, potassium, nitrate, and phosphorous levels in drinking water.

For industrial applications — or residential homeowners with a truly healthy budget — distillation systems also work well when it comes to removing and/or reducing metals from drinking water… but at this time we have no links to companies who supply distillation units. Perhaps one of our readers could help us out with this topic? 🙂

Measuring pH of your water

If your source water has an inherent low pH then your water may start to slowly, or quite rapidly in some cases, cause your plumbing and fixtures to begin corroding. You will not know if you have a pH problem unless you test your water’s pH using simple ‘dip and read’ test strips or an electronic pH Meter.

Interpreting pH testing results

Science states that…

– Water with a pH of 7.0 has a neutral, meaning not acidic and also not basic, pH.

– Water with a pH greater than 7.0 will more than likely exhibit basic, or alkaline tendencies.

– Water with a pH less than 7.0 will more than likely exhibit acidic tendencies.

Note: We used the phrase ‘more than likely’ just now because certain water conditions can render acidic or basic water less corrosive than expected, but as a general rule the further away from 7.0 that the pH of source water strays, the more destructive that water will become.

Correcting pH levels in source water

More than likely if you have issues with acidic water in your home or office you will want to treat your water using a point-of-entry device (such as a whole house water filter) rather than a point-of-use water filter (like a faucet, under sink or counter top water filter). Treating the water before it passes through your plumbing should help to prolong the life of your pipes and plumbing fixtures.

A whole house system such as the Crystal Quest Dual Tank Water Softener and Acid Neturalizer System offers a combination of a 20″ sediment filter, ion exchange water softening, an acid neutralizing media tank, and a 20″ solid carbon block filter.

While the purposes of acid neutralizing tank and water softening tank probably need no explaining, the purposes of the 20″ sediment filter and 20″ solid carbon block filter may.

By removing (unwanted) solids from the water the 20″ sediment filter will not only improves the quality of the water, but it also helps to prolong the life of the other filter components by preventing clogging. This should also mean fewer required backwash cycles, as well, for the system.

The 20″ carbon block filter reduces and/or removes volatile organic carbon compounds (VOC’s) such as insecticides, pesticides and industrial solvents — if present in the source water.

Correcting the pH of reverse osmosis water

Many reverse osmosis units these days come with the option of having a pH correcting ‘remineralizer’ post-filter installed for a very low cost. These inline filters put back desired minerals that make water taste like, well, the water we like to drink rather than flat tasting heavily filtered water and also adjust the pH back to around 7.0.

Moral of the story

Before installing ANY water treatment system ALWAYS have water tested thoroughly so that you don’t accidentally purchase (and install) a water filter that treats your water for the wrong issues.

As an example of one of those inquiries, a reader named SonyaBWell asked, “The guy at [a LARGE retail store in her area] told us reverse osmosis wasted water and that we would save aa whole lot of money at the end of the day with a combination of faucet, shower, counter filters like [a LARGE retail store in her area] carries. He said reverse osmosis wastes like 20 or more than 20 galons just to make 1 or 2 galons of good water. Is that true?”

First of all, yes, reverse osmosis water filters do discard water down the drain as part of their operating process BUT the numbers quoted by our friend at, well, that store, sound like numbers taken from either the worst reverse osmosis systems currently in production or from the owner manuals of units from years ago.

These days reverse osmosis units remove an extreme amount of potentially dangerous, unwanted drinking water contaminants and during that process they do create a waste water stream, yes, as we said a minute ago, but where did you THINK all those contaminants went?

The discard water washes away all the contaminants that get filtered out of the source water. Without the flow of discarded water, the contaminants would remain trapped someplace in the reverse osmosis membranes and quickly cause problems with clogging.

Bottled water ‘better’ than RO water when it comes to waste water

If you think buying bottled water will somehow ‘save the planet’ from unnecessarily wasted water, think again. The next time you fork over your well-deserved money for a conveniently packaged, well (or super) purified water, take a good look at the label and more than likely you will see that it came from a water source that got filtered, more than likely at some point, using reverse osmosis.

That means on a grand scale, at some water purification factory, hundreds of thousands (and possibly millions?) of gallons of water a year get ‘wasted’ so that you can sip clean water from your recently purchased, overpriced bottle of water.

When finished with your purchase of a product that more than likely ‘wasted’ water, please do not forget to properly recycle that plastic bottle, OK? Throwing it in the trash along with other waste and saying, “My city doesn’t recycle.” … doesn’t cut it, either.

Tons of communities do not have official recycling programs but if you asked around we feel quite certain you could find the names and locations of a few places where you could properly deposit separated, recyclable products.

The convenience of bottled water comes with the burden of social responsibility. More people need to realize that… and the fact that most bottled water companies utilize reverse osmosis as a means of purifying their product.

Reverse osmosis water filters… Past versus present

As a general rule, older reverse osmosis units did discard more water than the newer reverse osmosis units and pretty much no one will dispute that fact…. but the ratio of discarded water to clean, dispensable drinking water has come down quite a bit and many reputable reverse osmosis units now claim to discard as few as 2 or 3 gallons of water for every gallon of filtered drinking water produced.

One last word regarding reverse osmosis and ‘wasted’ water

Have you ever thought about the number of activities you witness and/or participate in on a daily basis that, ahem… ‘waste’ water? While very few would argue over the necessity of these activities, they all result in discarded water… just like reverse osmosis:

• Washing dishes by hand or in a dishwasher
• Cleaning clothes by hand or in a washing machine
• Cleansing one’s body in a shower or bath
• Flushing the toilet

So, if safe, clean drinking water does not appeal to you because of a belief that reverse osmosis water filters ‘waste’ water, then perhaps you should give up a few other things… like clean dishes, clothes, bodies, and toilets.

Moral of the story

Check the the ratio of discard water versus retained, filtered water of any reverse osmosis water filtration system prior to purchase and compare its ratio to those of similar units. While in the end you will still wind up ‘wasting’ water in the name of getting thoroughly scrubbed drinking water, at least you did your due diligence in an effort to minimize the impact your wanting clean drinking water will have on the environment.

Reverse osmosis water filtration systems do one heck of a job removing contaminants from drinking water. So do they remove minerals that nutritionists say we need in our diet? Yes, but the story does not end there so please keep reading.

The majority of our nutrition comes from what we eat. Proper portions of the (un-fried and non-buttered-up) major food groups should give most of us what we need even if trace elements of otherwise necessary earth elements get filtered out of our water supply by methods like distillation and/or reverse osmosis.

Another, and slightly more controversial, way to look at the matter involves assertions that the overall health picture of Americans continues to decline right alongside the amount of water that the average American consumes on a daily basis. So, if we as a population drink less water, then logic dictates that our wellness decline probably does not directly come from the quality of the water we drink.

That same logic could, however, point the finger of blame at the amount of water we drink. Few, if any, modern doctors would argue that the average human can live a healthy existence without enough water in his/her daily diet.

The Crystal Quest CQE-RO-00112 Water Filtration System
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For the past few years Sylvan lugged 5 gallon bottles of water around and paid a ton of money each week just so that his customers didn’t have to eat food cooked in chlorine and drink water that he currently refers to as ‘pool water’.

Sylvan had his water tested by a local lab and also tested it himself (using SenSafe Free Chlorine & SenSafe Total Chlorine) and the results always showed that his water contained far less free and total chlorine than the MCL (Maximum Contaminant Level) set by the USEPA — but that certainly did nothing about the stench of chlorine in his water.

In a case like this where a whole KITCHEN in a restaurant needs better quality water we believe devices like inline filters for ice makers and undersink water filters will not get the job done.

For applications where multiple unwanted water contaminants need to get removed on a larger scale (i.e. for a restaurant’s kitchen), commercial water filters stand out as ideal filtration options.

Other places where commercial water filters make the most sense include large private residences (over 4000 sq.feet), businesses, manufacturing facilities, apartment buildings, retail establishments, and schools.

In addition to high levels of chromium-6 found across the Coachella Valley, residents in east valley also cope with high well-water concentrations of another naturally occurring element: arsenic.

Thousands of residents live in areas that contain hazardous levels of arsenic in their groundwater, a problem that would cost millions to remedy.

In January 2010, Riverside County environmental health officials knew of wells at 19 mobile home and RV parks that had tested positive for dangerous levels of arsenic ranging from 12 to 91 parts per billion, a Desert Sun probe found.

Studies have linked arsenic, a naturally occurring tasteless and odorless element, to risks of cancer when ingested over decades at levels of more than 10 parts per billion, according to state and federal health officials. Children are even more susceptible because of their low body weight.

Federal health officials used to consider any levels of arsenic above 50 parts per billion unsafe. In 2000, they lowered the standard to 10 parts per billion, based on new studies. ( source )

For those who do not already know, “The USEPA has determined that ingesting arsenic in too high a quantity can make a person very ill and possibly even cause death. Throughout history, and possibly even in some countries today, you can find arsenic listed as an ingredient in mouse and rat poison. Additionally, the USEPA classifies arsenic as a carcinogenic compound.” ( source )

Testing for Arsenic?

As usual we will bring up one of our favorite water test kit lines, the Arsenic Quick line of home, field and industrial water testing kits for As⁺³ and As⁺⁵ dissolved in water.

We like this product Arsenic Quick product line for several reasons including, but not limited to, its use of food grade reagents for improved safety, its fast and easy testing procedures, its ability to detect very low concentrations w/o the use of a meter, and its affordability.

For under $20 the average person can get a test kit that will let them know if their well water contains unsafe levels of dissolved arsenic and the testing won’t take more than around 15 minutes.

For those in need of more definitive and potentially more legally defensible water testing options, contact your local health department for a list of local laboratories certified to perform the sort of water testing you require. And, as always, if no local labs exist, companies like National Testing Laboratories offer comprehensive water testing packages that include tests for a large number potential of water quality contaminants and critical water quality parameters.

Reducing Arsenic levels in Water?

Few methods for point-of-use arsenic reduction/removal exist for homeowners except for units such as the Pentek RO-3500 Reverse Osmosis System which bears NSF 58 Certification for the reduction of unwanted drinking water contaminants such as Pentavalent Arsenic, Barium, Cadmium, Copper, Hexavalent & Trivalent Chromium, Cyst, Fluoride, Lead, Nitrate/Nitrite, Radium 226/228, Selenium, TDS and Turbidity.

Other, more robust 4 and 5 stage reverse osmosis systems such as the Goldline 5-Stage Reverse Osmosis System also bear the NSF 58 mark and include additional features such as pre and post carbon block filters for additional water polishing.

Pentek RO-3500 Reverse Osmosis Water System