How To Use Less Pool Chemicals
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Without a doubt one of the most common questions that I receive from pool owners through my swimming pool consulting service is about how to go chlorine free, or they ask for help finding an alternative to to chlorine. When pressed on the question most pool owners state that they are looking to have less exposure to chemicals in general, and chlorine usually tops the list of things they want to avoid. Almost without fail this request for fewer pool chemicals will come along with a story about being allergic to chlorine. As it turns out chlorine allergy is extremely uncommon. What is in fact very common is for swimming pools to be poorly balanced and chemically managed even with the pool owner thinks they are doing a great job because the water looks clean. As a pool and spa specialist I can assure you that it is more common for pool water to be bad than good despite what the pool owner might think about that statement. Usually when someone says they are allergic to chlorine they are actually reacting to a poorly managed pool.
It would be easy to attribute a chlorine allergy to a reaction to pool water, especially if the water looked fine, or the other bathers are all fine after swimming in the same water. Different people have different sensitivities to chemical balance within the water. The pH is the most common culprit as some people are very sensitive to pH too far from their own pH level. Also a common cause is combined chlorine levels which indicate the water is in need of breakpoint chlorination. Both of these would be much more common to cause a reaction that an allergy to chlorine, and poorly managed pH and high combined chlorine levels are both as common as the day is long in residential swimming pools. When you hear hooves, think horses, not zebras. If you react to pool water, look first at these two very common causes for reactions and do not assume it is chlorine as chlorine is the single line of defense you have against dangerously unsafe pool water. Learn more about this in this article about the dangers of going chlorine free.
How to use less pool chemicals - The answer to this question is so simple that pool owners have just overlooked it in general. It sounds almost too simple such that pool owners don't even believe it and continue looking for some chemical alternative to chlorine which is a risky path to head down. The much more simple solution is to use the system already in place to help you with this, but to simply use it better. The average pool owner filters their pool water around one time every day. This means a 20,000 gallon pool filters about 20,000 gallons per day. Some pools do more, some pools do less, but this is about the average as this will likely result in the water staying clear. In reality you are leaving a ton of room for improvement due to the fact that you are simply not filtering all of your pool every day. If you think logically you can see it. If you have a 20,000 gallon pool and you only filter 20,000 gallons in a day, then you can safely assume that there is some pool water which was not filtered at all. With the way clean, filtered water diffuses within the vessel, the water needs to be filtered more than once by volume in order to get all of the water. The first volume turnover nets 63% of the water in your pool, and the second nets 86%. The third turnover results in 95% of the water in the pool being filtered one time, and the fourth turnover results in 98% of the water being filtered at least one time. So you can see how only having one turnover per day will leave a good deal of debris and organic contamination within the water. Any contamination not removed by filtration must be dealt with chemically. If you remove that debris with mechanical filtration then you simply need less chlorine to treat what you did not filter out.
The price of 24 hour water filtration - It has long since been the case that swimming pool filtration is expensive since swimming pool pumps, largely, are enormous energy hogs. A swimming pool pump can use up to half of the total power used in a home in a month. That is a shockingly high number, pun intended. If that interests you then you can learn more about this in this article about how much power does a pool pump use? With variable speed pumps now replacing single speed pumps for all pools it no longer makes sense to turn off your pool for part of the day. 24 hour filtration is how you save the most money in fact. Simply take your total 24 hour filtration goal and then break it down into low speed, medium speed and high speed settings for the entire day. No need to have your pump turned off at all. If you can afford to have the pump off, then instead leave it run but reduce the speeds that you operate the pump at slightly. Long hours at low speeds are where variable speed pump savings really stack up. If you want to have exposure to as few chemicals in your pool as possible then you need to adopt a 24 hour filtration schedule, but you should also invest a little more money into the power your pump uses to allow you to filter more water. Pursuit of the cheapest possible water filtration for your pool is one goal you can pursue, but if you want less chemical exposure then that is a different goal with a different approach. One that is worth investing in a little more. Why do the bare minimum with filtration when you can use an ultra efficient variable speed pump on a 24 hour schedule and get tons of filtration for very affordable prices. No need to skimp on filtration any more...especially when it is the one thing that will actually get you what you are looking for, less chemicals, while doing it safely and without compromises to the quality of your chemical management of the pool.
There it is in black and white. If you really want less chemical exposure then you need to up your filtration game from one turnover per day to three turnovers per day at the absolute minimum. If you really want the least chemicals possible then go for five or even ten turnovers per day through the filtration system. There is absolutely no harm in filtering your water a lot over and above the cost of electricity to do so, which you can mitigate with a smart, dynamic 24 hour variable speed pump filtration schedule. If you want lower exposure to chemicals then you should be filtering your water like a crazy person. Maybe even upgrade your sand filter to a more capable filter like a cartridge filter, which can filter much finer debris as well as being designed for optimum flow dynamics. Unlike sand filters which are are one of the largest restrictions to flow you can have on an equipment pad, largely due to the multiport valve that controls the water flow through the filter.
There is no limit to how much you can reduce chemical exposure with these methods. The more you filter your water, the cleaner it will be and the fewer contaminants that will exist within the water requiring chemical intervention. Simple. Rarely do you get answers so simple within the pool and spa industry. Enjoy this win for what it is and increase your filtration amounts today to lower your chlorine exposure tomorrow. Perhaps consider adding something like a UV lamp as well which you can read about in this article on how to get the best pool water.
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Swimming Pool Steve is an award winning, second generation swimming pool and spa specialist from Ontario Canada. With over 10,000,000 views on the Swimming Pool Steve YouTube Channel, winner of the 2018 Pool & Spa Industry Leadership award and author of hundreds of pool and spa articles both online and in print Steve is committed to helping pool and spa owners as well as pool and spa industry workers learn more about the technical side of building, renovating, repairing and maintaining all types of swimming pools and spas. Follow Swimming Pool Steve on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.
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