Water softeners have become one of the most vital parts of home appliances in the USA.
Around 85-percent of the home gets hard water, and to make that water drinkable and usable for average homes, we use water softeners.
It is not like the water that we get from the municipal government is completely unprocessed.
They got their water softeners and at their level, they remove bacteria and viruses.
Actually, the more hardness comes in the water from the pipes, if you see the water fetched from wells and undergrounds, you would not be able to use that water even after processing.
So, the municipal government uses Chlorine and Chloramine for killing bacteria, and other contaminations from the water.
Your water softeners may remove the minerals, such as Calcium and Magnesium, but due to their incapability to remove chlorine, sometimes households consume chlorine unknowingly.
Although the level of Chlorine in the hard water we get is minimal. And in most cases, it is not harmful to us.
But you never know when the chlorine level is high and when is low, as most of the water softeners are not designed to remove chlorine.
How to get that extra chlorine out of your system, so that it could not harm us.
This guide is going to give you insight into Chlorine removal from the water, and are water softeners capable enough to remove the chlorine? Let’s get into it.
What is Chlorine?
Chlorine is among one of the top 10 chemicals produced in the United States.
Its commercial and industrial uses are amazing, and its use for removing contamination, viruses, and bacteria, to make water drinkable and usable for humans are extraordinary.
If Chlorine is consumed above a certain level, it can put our health at harm not only that, those around us.
Chlorine is a gas that appears yellow-green, it is not inflammable but it can take parts in explosive, and explosive reactions, when mixed or combined with other compounds such as Acetylene, ammonia.
Chlorine consumes or we exposed it higher than a certain level can pose multiple negative health impacts. Such as the sensation of burning in the throat, eyes, or nose.
It alters the flavor and taste of the water, and sometime, combine with the other substance in water and change the water’s chemical composition that leading to harm.
Human skin exposure to chlorine can lead to skin injuries such as frostbite, and many others.
If you are already suffering from skin, and hair diseases, it may ignite your skin allergy and worsen the condition.
Chest tightness, coughing, trouble breathing can be because you consumed chlorine-infected water.
So, as you can see the impacts of excessive chlorine in your water can lead to many serious health concerns.
So, you must use a water softener or follow any other method that at least removes the chlorine smell from water.
Does Water Softener Remove Chlorine?
To learn does water softer removes chlorine from the water you need to know how a water softener works.
Actually, water softeners are designed to remove hardness from water. Hardness such as minerals, calcium and magnesium, and iron.
In the tap water, Municipal Government mixes Chlorine and Chloramine to remove contaminations, bacteria, and viruses.
Our tap water is already processed and filtered through high-quality filters to make them usable for consumers.
It is the pipes that corrosion and mixes iron and many other contaminations in the water. So, softeners were designed to remove those contaminations from the water.
A water softener usually consists of two tanks. A brine tank and a resin tank.
A brine tank is where brine solution is made, here we top up the tank with salt to make a brine solution.
On the other hand, the resin tanks come with beads that are negatively charged.
Brine solution or salt particles are positively charged particles, they cling to the beads and make the beads positively charged.
When tap water is flushed through the beads, they capture the minerals, and sodium part combined with the water particles.
You can see that to remove chlorine there is no special process. The whole process is designed to remove minerals.
To remove Chlorine, and even some iron contamination from water, you will have to install dedicated filters or media screens.
If your water softener comes equipped with extra or additional filters that can capture chlorine particles, before the tap water enters the system, you are good to go, to consume that water.
3 Ways To Remove Chlorine From Water
You have seen that an average water softener does not come with the system to remove chlorine from it.
So, to get the water softener equipped and prepared to remove chlorine, you have to use extra tools, filters, or media screens.
If you want me to explore some more methods to remove chlorine from water, Here I am with an additional solution.
I am mentioning three methods to remove chlorine from water. These are not the only methods, you can follow any, as per your requirements, suitability, and budget range.
1. Reverse Osmosis
The Reverse Osmosis process is an ideal way to remove not only chlorine but 99 percent of the contaminations.
In this method, the water is fed through a pump, it passes through the RO membrane under a pressure.
The membrane only allows small water molecules to pass through, and reject other contaminations such as salt, calcium, magnesium, and other substances.
They discharge through the reject stream and accumulate in a different tank or a container.
This reject stream contamination or gathering also goes through or feeds through the motor to the membrane once again.
You can install a reverse osmosis system before your water softener. This method is great because it will remove most of the contaminations from your water.
It not only protects your expensive water softener system, and its internal components.
2. Granular Activated Carbon:
The Granular Activated carbon method is often used for removing carbon from hard water during the softening process.
Here, you are not required to purchase any additional accessories or appliances, just a few tweaks, and granular activated carbon and there you are with removed chlorine.
During this method, the resin beads which are charged with sodium ions mix with the carbon to remove the chlorine from water when water passes through it.
The method of removing chlorine from water is effective for almost 2-3 years. On the other hand, the resin beads used in the resin tank last for almost 10-years, if are taken good care of.
3. Use of Chlorine Remover
The use of powerful chlorine granular media is an efficient way to remove chlorine from the water in large containers.
If any of the methods are not working for you, and in your water, there is a huge quantity of chlorine, then use chlorine remover such as KDF-55.
This is a granular media, designed to remove excess chlorine mixed in the water.
Using this remover makes your water soft, it is recommended that you place this in a media guard at, the bottom of the water softening valve.
When water enters the system, it is flushed through the basket that has media installed for removing the chlorine.
How does a water softener work to remove chlorine?
Water softeners when used with the right filters can easily remove chlorine in your water.
Yes, you can remove the chlorine and drink water at the same time, only when used with additional softeners filters.
The easiest and go-to option is catalytic filtering. The process works almost the same as the ion exchange method with an additional step. I
n this method, you just used extra chlorine to remove the contaminations including chlorine.
If you don’t like more mixing of Carbon in the brine tank, you may go with the GA method we mentioned above.
This method does not involve any chemical combinations, but the addition of an extra filter layer to filter chlorine from the water. But its disadvantage is it does not last more than 2-3 years.
The easiest and most efficient way to remove chlorine is to use additional filters with water softeners.
Don’t hire another appliance just to remove chlorine, you already have one installed, use it rightly and fix things easily.
Does Boiling Water Remove Chlorine?
Boiling water is a great technique to remove impurities and bacteria.
If you have no other access method to make your water drinkable, get it boiled. But boiling water does not remove calcium, magnesium, and other ions.
Will a water softener remove scale from pipes?
Water softeners can not remove scale from pipes and faucets.
But it can affect the hardness of the water, and make it soft so that it does not build upscale in the pipes.
When it is softened water, no scales will build up inside the pipes.
Does salt remove chlorine from water?
Many homeowners wrongly believe that a regular water softener can remove chlorine along with other impurities from the water.
Actually, if your water softener is not equipped with the right gears, the additional filters required to remove chlorine from the water, would not remove it, and you would not able to use that water for bathing, cleaning, and even drinking.
It is not that salt removes the chlorine. It does not depend on the salt or any other thing, it is the additional filter or chlorine removers that can capture and remove chlorine from the water.
Do water softeners kill bacteria?
Your water softeners do not kill bacteria in water. It is actually the municipal committee that mixes chlorine and chloramine to kill bacteria and viruses mixed in the water. This is where tap water comes mixed with chlorine.
One more thing, not all bacteria is bad for your health. Some bacteria are good for your health, take the example of Yogurt, they are good for your health and improve your system.
Conclusion
Water softeners are great and must-have a home appliance. It removes minerals such as magnesium, and calcium from the water and makes water consumable for not only drinking but other household use.
But sometimes tap water comes with additional chlorine mixed. The chlorine mixing in the water makes them not good for health.
To make that water consumable, you can’t use water softeners. Water softeners are not equipped or integrated with the features to remove chlorine.
So, we mentioned how you can make your water softeners ready to remove chlorine. We mentioned more than one method, follow any and get things to smoothen for you.
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