In SA, water is being treated with Chloramine. This is the extract from SA Water’s website, which can be verified by the link.
“Chloramine is used to safely disinfect water supplies across Australia and overseas. SA Health, through the Australian Drinking Water Guidelines, and the World Health Organisation both recognise that chloramine is safe and effective.
Like chlorine, chloramine destroys bacteria and other pathogens that can be present in source water and ensures your tap water is clean and safe to drink. Because chloramine is better than chlorine at penetrating longer pipes it’s used in our longer water distribution systems across the state.
Chloraminated water is also a better tasting tap water. It regularly performs well in the annual best tasting South Australian tap water program, and is a favourite during our own blind taste tests. In a blind controlled study of drinking water from the Myponga Reservoir, people preferred the taste of chloraminated water, compared to chlorinated water, which can have a distinct taste and smell.
Like all drinking water, chloraminated tap water must be neutralised before it is used in fish tanks, aquariums and ponds to protect your fish or other living aquatic creatures. This can be done using a product such as a water conditioner or a carbon filter. If you’re not sure, or you’d like specific advice on the most appropriate product for your situation, please contact your local pet shop or aquarium retailer.
While very small amounts of ammonia can sometimes be present naturally in fish tanks, the higher levels of ammonia through the use of chloramine to disinfect drinking water can be harmful to fish and aquatic amphibians, even at low levels.”
Now, I know that water has been treated by Chlorine for many years, but I have never heard of Chloramine.. So exactly what is Chloramine?
Chloramine is created by combining chlorine and ammonia, which has the benefits of longevity over using pure chlorine as a disinfectant of water. Water needs a disinfectant to kill bacteria as water travels long distances from catchment areas to where it is used. Failure to treat water can result in severe cases of disease and even death.
Chlorine quickly evaporates from water just by standing in a jug, but when boiling the Chlorine is more quickly dissipated from the water. Unfortunately the same is not so with Chloramine, which is far more stable than Chlorine and as a result is difficult to remove from water.
Is this a problem?
There are set safety levels that the authorities must adhere to, which requires continual monitoring by the water authorities. But set safety levels aside there are major problems with Chloramines.
- Chloramines are all respiratory irritants with trichloramine being the most toxic (order of toxicity: monochloramine < dichloramine < trichloramine-most severe.)
- Chloramine or monochloramine is unfortunately not something that could be considered as harmless, so much so in fact that it is toxic to marine life. This is stated in the above extract from SA Water. So is it really harmless to humans or your pet?
- Monochloramine reacts with copper, there are legal cases now in the USA where people are seeking compensation after their copper pipes became corroded after the introduction of chloramines.
- Erin Brockovich has stated that “Chloramine is 200 times less effective than chlorine in killing e-coli bacteria, rotaviruses, and polio.”
Other health effects of elevated levels of chloramine are:
- Respiratory problems and increased asthma risk from breathing in vapor containing chloramines
- Produces denaturation of hemoglobin in the bloodstream.
- Higher exposure can cause a build up of fluid in the lungs, a medical emergency, with severe shortness of breath
- Dry, itchy, flaking skin
- Dandruff and itchy scalp
- Dry mouth, lips and throat
- Aggravated digestive disorders
Therefore, this chemical needs to be treated with even more respect than Chlorine which is also harmful, but less toxic in water.
I notice that my skin in the warmer months, becomes itchy and flaky, could that be due to the increased use of Chloramine. One thing when I go away on travels to NSW and Queensland I do not have the same problem with my skin. Does NSW and Queensland only use Chlorine to treat their water. Investigation on NSW and Queensland websites shows that they only use Chlorine, no mention of Chloramine. While not a scientific study by any means (but a personal observation) it does raise a few concerns about the safety of Chloramine.
Can you get rid of Chloramine?
The answer is yes, but the process is difficult. Reverse Osmosis is the only effective method of removing Chloramine, other than boiling water for hours. As no-one is going to bothered in boiling water for hours, RO must be used.
For every 5-6 litres water you get 1 litre of RO treated water. The RO water is almost free from all contaminants that effect the quality of the water including;
- Fluoride 93.6%
- Lead 98.6%
- Chlorine 95%
- Copper 98.5%
- Selenium 97.9%
- Total Dissolved Solids Reduction 90.8%
- Cadmium 99.1%
- Arsenic 88.0%
- Chromium Cr 6 96.4%
- Turbidity 99.1%
- Barium 96.3%
What about Chloramine? A special 1 micron filter is required to remove this contaminant from the water and mud be specified. The waste water from the RO filter can still be used for your garden or washing clothes. Under the bench kits can be purchased and installed by you, and if you already use a filter system can easily be swapped over to the more effective RO filters.
The only problem with the RO Filters is that you will need to change the filters every 6mths to 12 mths. Failure to do so will result in dirty drinking water (like you get straight from the tap).
So if you are considering your health, and want to ensure that you get pure and health water, consider buying an RO filtration system at least for the water you drink.