Hold the salt

Waterloo Region, Guelph testing an alternative to water softeners

KITCHENER — The Region of Waterloo and the City of Guelph will be giving 18 households an alternative to traditional water softeners as part of a year-long study.

The region hopes the study shows there’s a practical alternative to traditional water softeners, which use a lot of water and dump thousands of tonnes of salt into the Grand River every year.

Both municipalities get most of their water from groundwater, which picks up minerals in the ground such as calcium and magnesium. As a result, the two have some of the hardest water in the country.

Hard water is healthy to drink, but many people don’t like it because the minerals from hard water build up on pipes, fixtures and appliances; hard water also needs more soap to create lather for bathing and washing.

As a result, most households in the region use water softeners, which remove the minerals from tap water.

But the softeners take a toll on the environment. The ion exchange water softeners that are most popular use salt to remove the hard minerals from the water. But the softer water has a higher salt content, which is why it’s not recommended that people use softened water for drinking or cooking.

All that salt eventually ends up in the Grand River. The region estimates about 20,000 tonnes of salt from water softeners finds its way into the river every year.

The softeners also use water to recharge the resin that removes the minerals from the water. Every year, water softeners in the region consume about 1.5 million cubic metres of water — about the same amount 6,500 households would use in a year.

So the region and the city of Guelph have partnered to fund research into which water softeners use the least water and the least salt. They also tested an alternative to the standard water softener, which uses no salt and no water.

Those earlier tests found that the alternative units, which use polymer beads to convert the hard minerals in the water into microscopic crystals that don’t form scale on appliances or pipes, cost about the same as the salt-based softeners. The test found that the units didn’t require any work, other than replacing the polymer beads about every four years. “You install this thing and you’re done,” said Steve Gombos, water efficiency manager with Waterloo Region.

“Now we need to find out: what do people think about these units?” Gombos said. “Do you like the water that you get? Can you live with it? What’s the effect on soap?”

In the study, 18 households — nine in each municipality — will get an alternative unit installed in their home, which they’ll use for a year. At the end of the year, they can keep the unit if they want. The study isn’t recruiting any more participants, Gombos said.

The $130,000 study (the costs are split equally by the municipalities) will report by February 2019 on whether people were happy with the units.

Asked if it makes sense for the region to get involved in research like this, Gombos said municipalities across North America regularly fund research into things like water quality. Municipalities help fund the research that showed some low-flush toilets worked better than others, Gombos said.

“We don’t sell water softeners or the alternative technology,” he said. “Our interest is strictly: How good is it? How can we improve our environment?”

While the sample sizes are small, Dave Kains of Metroline Research Group, which is carrying out the study, said the participants were found through an initial random survey and then winnowed down to ensure they are all comparable. The project is looking for qualitative data, about whether the units work and what sort of impact they have on the households that use them, Kains said.

The region has set up a website, watersoftenerfacts.ca, where people can get more information about water softeners and how to choose the most efficient one for their needs.