Do I need a water softener to have safe drinking water?
Categories:
Utilities Operations
Drinking Water Quality
No, water softeners and home water treatment devices are not needed to make the water safe as Plant City’s drinking water meets federal and state drinking water standards. In fact, if not properly maintained, the devices may cause water quality problems. As with installing a home water treatment device, this is a personal decision the customer will need to make! The water softener replaces the harmless hardness minerals with sodium. You may want to connect the softener to the hot water line only, because this will avoid any high concentrations of sodium in your drinking / cooking water (cooking should be done with cold water, since hot water is more likely to contain rust and lead from your household plumbing and water heater). “Hardness” in drinking water is caused by calcium and magnesium. It is called hardness because if calcium and magnesium are present in your water, making a lather or suds for washing is “harder” (more difficult) to do than with soft water. Some textbooks define hard water as a water with a hardness of more than 100 mg/L as calcium carbonate, some describe a moderately hard to hard water in a range of 91 – 130 mg/L of calcium carbonate; Plant City’s water runs around 180 mg/L (10.5 grains).
Updated 2/5/2021 9:09 AM