There have been a number of customers who have asked about the possibility of
Endocrine Disrupting Compounds (EDC’s) in the water supply. Reportably, these
compounds come from many sources from: chemical waste to plastics residues to
household wastes washed down the sink. When ingested these EDC’s cause the
endocrine system (which produces hormones for various bodily functions) to be
disrupted and cause abnormal reactions. Part of these same reports state that
the public water treatment systems couldn’t take the EDC’s out. The question was
then put to me; “Does your water store treatment system take out EDC’s?”
My response has been that if the EDC’s are chemicals, our Carbon Systems
would probably take out anything left after the water went through our Reverse
Osmosis. Even though the EPA was reporting that the municipal treatment plants
were not being able to remove the EDC’s with their Carbon Filtration. The reason
a water store could probably remove the compounds when the city municipal plant
couldn’t is because: of the amount of time the water is in contact with the
Activated Carbon giving the activated carbon more time and ability to pull out
the chemicals; we use a great deal of Solid Carbon Block filters, which force
the chemicals into contact with the Activated Carbon allowing the chemicals to
be easily removed; we use a number of different types of carbon which have a
preference for different types of chemicals; the water has been cleaned
considerably by the time it gets to the water store making it easier to treat.
If the compounds were organic then I would expect that nature would decompose
them over time.
While reading through a trade magazine an announcement caught my eye. The
AWWA Research Foundation controlled by the American Water Works Association, an
organization for public water supplies, ran tests on the removal of EDC’s and
they found Ultraviolet Light and Hydrogen Peroxide would remove the tested EDC’s.
This tells me the EDC’s were compounds that sunlight will decompose in time
since Ultraviolet Light is the degenerating element of sun light.
We use Ultraviolet Light twice in our process, once as part of the
pretreatment and again as the final treatment. Ultraviolet Light has been used
primarily to remove pathogens such as bacteria but is very good in altering or
decomposing chemical compounds. We also use Chlorine Dioxide for disinfection,
which is one of the three peroxides and is very similar to Hydrogen Peroxide.
Too, our water here is close to the headwaters, as there are few
municipalities up stream from us that could be dumping contaminates into our
water. So I would think there would be little reason for worries concerning
EDC's in the tap water and no reason for concern with water from water stores,
vending machines or home water treatment systems.