When it comes to cleaning up salty, brackish, water from a well, or even water laced with a lot of iron, manganese, sulphur, etc., reverse osmosis reviews are very good. And, I would say well deserved. However, RO technology is costly and cumbersome to say the least, and, unless you have the salt water problem, there are now much better systems to use. Today we will do a reverse osmosis water treatment comparison with more modern technology.
In large areas of the U.S., people are dealing with brackish water, or water with high mineral content. I have been offered such water that I just could not drink due to the strong taste or smell. I have also tasted the water after it was filtered with a RO system and, although the owner’s though it tasted great, I always found it to be “stale” tasting.
The weird taste is a small thing, but it is a symptom of something larger. The flatness comes from the fact that the RO process removes ALL the minerals from the water, including trace minerals such as calcium and potassium our bodies need to maintain good health. Also, this demineralization makes the water slightly acidic and, if consumed, this water will try to return to a neutral pH by leaching calcium from bones or teeth. If you use a RO system, you may want to consider adding mineral supplements to your diet.
Many experts in the areas of health and nutrition feel water stripped of minerals is unhealthy if used on a long-term basis, since cancer seems to only exist in environments which are acidic.
Water is put under pressure in an RO system and forced through a membrane with very tiny pores. So tiny in fact that only molecules the size of a water molecule, or smaller, can pass. It is very crutial to the process that the water pressure be maintained and this may call for an auxiliary pump to be installed.
The pores of the membranes are so small that even with sufficient pressure much of the water cannot be forced thru the RO membrane and is simply flushed. This adds to the operating costs.
Since about 1900, chlorine has been the poison of choice to clean up the bacteria in our water systems and you do not want to drink it, or its byproducts. However, RO systems will not remove chlorine, or any other of the synthetic organic chemicals (SOCs) we have in our water, as their molecules are too small and will go right through the membrane. The RO systems must be used together with an activated charcoal filter.
All water filtration systems impede water flow to some extent, but RO systems are notoriously slow. Large, whole house systems require an additional storage tank in order to provide adequate water for laundry or bathing.
These units are bulky, comparatively, and with the extra pumps, storage tanks, etc., they generally will require the assistance of a plumber to install and, even then, will often lead to maintenance issues. These extra components also make them prone to higher initial costs and higher operating costs, which are two of the leading gripes that come up in reverse osmosis reviews.
Ninety-five percent of households in the US get their drinking water from some sort of chlorinated source such as a well or a utility company. If that’s the case with you as well, you might want to compare a selective filtration system (also called multi-stage) against the RO system.
In multi-stage filtration the water flows through activated carbon that has been blended with a filter resin and compressed into a solid block. This modern technology filters out the chemicals with the carbon, the minerals leave through ion-exchange, and the rest of the bad guys get trapped with the tiny submicron filter pores. All you get is clean, healthy water with all the healthy minerals still there (by choice).
And, it’s all done with no pumps, no storage tanks, no extra maintenance or operating costs, and no need for mineral supplements.
