12/8/2010: Reconfiguration of 5- and 6-stage LivingWaters Systems

From Lono Ho'ala, Director of Engineering Services
LivingWaters™ Engineered Water Systems

We have had to change the configuration of our systems. As you may be aware, there is a new form of heterotrophic bacteria that is starting to grow in the water lines in places that chloraminate the water. This bacteria creates an acidic by-product that is eating away the lime-scale inside the water mains and is exposing the public to high levels of lead that leaches out into the product water. This is something that became apparent a couple of years ago.

However, what no one knew until about three months ago is that this same bacteria is capable of colonizing certain media used in water treatment cartridges. In our system they can't get through, but their metabolites impart a strong odor to the water that some people describe as "dirty socks."

We first experienced this problem in municipal water in Boston about a year ago. Shortly thereafter it showed up in Florida, then Washington D. C., followed by Virginia, and has been working its way west. I am sad to see that it is now showing up here in Colorado.

When the problem first appeared it was very difficult to diagnose. Both Watts Water Quality and Conditioning and Pentair (I am a consulting engineer for both of these companies) have spent a lot of time and money trying to figure it out because they received a ton of complaints - especially from municipal and industrial customers using pleated poly filters. The clue came when we realized it only happens in chloraminated water supplies or very occasionally in wells when this bacteria infects a well when a pump installer replaces well pumps or otherwise services a well and has that bacteria on his hands. In municipal water, the chloramine is not a strong enough disinfectant to kill these bacteria while in chlorinated systems they can't survive.

As a result of this problem, we have changed our cartridge configuration. In our case, the Argonide NanoCeram Superfilters were the place where these bacteria were growing. To solve this problem Argonide added silver to their nano-alumina matrix, similar to how Doulton does their ceramic filters. This keeps the bacteria from colonizing the filter media and so far, it seems to have done the trick. Be aware that no silver makes it into the finished water.

For those who are getting the odor, the solution is a cartridge change to our new media. It is not a warranty issue because the system and/or cartridges are not defective. It is simply a new bacteria that is chloramine resistant. Because our system blocks these bacteria from passing through, they build up and eventually cause the odor.

So, our new configuration which we just added in the last two weeks is as follows:

Cartridge #1: LW10FRC - Fluoride/Arsenic Removal Cartridge
Cartridge #2: LW10KPAC2.5 - Argonide Superfilter with Powdered Activated Carbon and KDF®55 for sediment, turbidity, heavy metals, and improving redox potential
Cartridge #3: LW10DFMF - Norit Microbiological Filter with Carbon Block and Capillary Membrane Technology
Cartridge #4: LWIL12CAC - Catalytic Carbon Technology for Chloramine and Difficult to Remove Chemicals

Right now we are working on a way to add the chloramine and the turbidity removal to a countertop system. Our existing systems with the old design still work well on the vast majority of waters, but if they get installed on water in places like Boston, New York or San Francisco where the water lines are very old and there is lots of colloidal turbidity in the water, the Norit Microbiological Filters can plug up in as little as a month and we don't want unhappy customers in those markets. Hopefully we'll have that worked out soon, but right now the 6-stage undercounters are the only ones that will handle chloramine and colloidal turbidity in all markets.

FOLLOW-UP NOTE: A 6-stage countertop system was released in August 2011 to take care of the chloramine issue.