Water Purification Importance: Elk Grove’s Rural Challenges

Elk Grove’s beautiful citrus trees, the pretty ones with fresh oranges hanging off them, are in danger. Something called the Asian Citrus Psyllid has been detected in our area. It’s a bug that carries Huanglongbing, a bacterial disease. While you can see the bugs with the naked eye, they don’t look much different than brown flecks, and by the time you find out that there’s a problem, your trees might already be dead.

This story about the citrus got me thinking about something we don’t talk about enough: the quality of water in our homes, which can also carry hard to detect pollutants. Water quality is about more than just keeping out toxins, though. Purified water has so many benefits for your home including softer laundry, spot-free dishes, and tap water that tastes great.

Purification is especially important in areas like Elk Grove where suburban sprawl meets rural landscapes, and homeowners sometimes find themselves dealing with problems like the Asian Citrus Psyllid bug that seem more at home on farms. Improving water purification and quality may seem unnecessary, but, trust me, quality of life improves once your home has the cleanest water possible.

Deal with Dirty Drinking Water

Have you ever gone to your fridge and found your Brita pitcher empty, no bottled water in sight? Before my home had a water purification system, I used to drink tap water, of course, but it never tasted quite as good as the filtered stuff. So, before we talk solutions, I want to clarify the reasons so many of us prefer bottled or filtered water over the tap:

• Pollutants: There have been extensive studies in the past decade, and they’ve found pollutants in tap water. This probably isn’t a big problem in Elk Grove, where the city keeps careful tabs on water, but in rural areas nearby things like fertilizer and pesticides seep into the ground, which is especially dangerous for homes with private wells.
• Chemicals: Some people also have mixed feelings about the chemicals cities use to purify water, like fluoride and chlorine. In my experience, almost everyone agrees chlorine makes water taste funny. A good water filtration system will remove the chemicals, vastly improving the taste of your water.

Clean Your Water, Clean Your Life

Maybe you love your Brita pitcher, or you work for a bottled water company who gives you expensive cases of filtered water for free. Even if you’re not interested in drinking tap water, having purified H2O in your home will still contribute to your overall health—chlorinated or hard water can be very damaging to your body.

Elk Grove’s most recent water report shows the chlorine level at 1.02 PPM, or parts per million. That number is enough to interfere with your health and beauty routine. Take your hair  for instance. So many people worry about the effect unpurified water, specifically chlorinated water, has on hair that health and beauty magazines have written articles about ways to counter its drying effect, and the subsequent breakage. Here’s an idea: why not eliminate the chlorine from your life altogether? Then, you won’t need the remedies.

Taking chlorine out of water can also benefit your skin, reducing the risk of eczema, acne, and other rashes. In other words, clean water can give you healthier skin and hair less susceptible to drying out, which is especially important this time of year in a place like Elk Grove, as the upcoming seasons will bring 100 degrees days May to September.

Water Filtration Systems 101

The problems associated with polluted or overly-chlorinated water have become clear—as clear as a crisp glass of filtered H2O. So, what can be done to fix the water quality in your home? I’d suggest looking into having a water filtration installed by a professional. There are so many good options available that it can sometimes seem difficult to pick the right one, but a local professional can help, one who knows Elk Grove, its hard water problems—and its solutions.

One thing you can actively evaluate is a system’s grains per gallon, or GPG, which is a unit of water hardness defined as 1 grain of calcium carbonate dissolved in 1 gallon of water. The harder water is, the higher the chance it will leave spots on your dishes or wreak havoc with your skin and hair.  Use these numbers as a guide:

• 0 to 3.5 GPG: soft water

• 3.56 to 7.01 GPG: moderately hard water

• 7.06 to 10.51 GPG: hard water

• 10.57 and up: very hard water

Elk Grove doesn’t keep a record of water hardness, but I’ve known homeowners there who’ve had shower doors stained by hard water. When you decide to get a water filtration system to soften your water, don’t commit halfway. Choose one that will guarantee soft water, preferably 0 GPG. These systems will protect you from pollutants as well, giving your home pure, healthy, delicious water. You’ll no longer have to worry about safety every time you get thirsty. And a good system will also filter out chlorine, which your skin and hair will appreciate. Just make sure you’ve picked an expert in installation.

One thing I offer every customer in Elk Grove is a free water quality analysis, because, as I said above, the city keeps some water info on record, but not necessarily in all the areas you might be interested in, including water hardness. After an analysis, you’ll get a recommendation for a customized system. We have three different ones available, each capable of filtering water hardness down to 0 GPG, but you still need to know which one best fits your particular home. Stop settling for water that dries out your body and opens you up to invisible pollutants, and start enjoying the benefits of clean, ready to drink, natural tasting water.

Wondering about your water quality? Contact our trained professionals at Bell Brothers to schedule an appointment for a free analysis today.