What Do UV and Ozone Do in a Pool?
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Ozone, UV and AOP - Oh My! What do these three things all have in common when it comes to swimming pools and swimming pool water chemistry maintenance? Each of these peripheral devices (in their own ways) can contribute to cleaner, healthier water in your pool with a measurable reduction in the amount of chemicals like chlorine you need to add. How these systems work is to supplement some of the oxidation and sanitizing function of the chlorine. They do not replace the use of chlorine, but instead provide mechanical and chemical oxidation at the point where water passes through them (in the equipment installation).
This reduces the amount of "work" that the chlorine in your pool needs to do, reducing the total chlorine demand for your pool even though these system can actually consume some chlorine themselves as part of how they function and interact with your pool water. In total you could still experience a reduction in the amount of chlorine your pool uses seasonally but some pools will have more pronounced benefits than others.
Which pools should use ozone, UV or AOP? - Not every swimming pool will benefit directly from using ozone, UV or AOP. Certainly each system might provide some benefits, such as a high water quality in general, but they will not necesarily make the day to day care of the pool much easier. Nor will they equal a return on investment in chemical savings in most pools. Usually the pools that benefit most from these systems are either pools where the highest quality of water and lowest chemical usage is the paramount concern, or pools with very heavy bather turnover with a lot of organic debris, sunscreen and oils etc. These pools are the ones that would generally benefit most from a peripheral system like this. So which one is right for your pool?
Ozone systems are effective and often used in aquarium systems for water maintenance. Swimming pools can benefit in the same way however many of the commercially available ozone systems do not put out an appreciable amount of ozone. In other words it would take a much, much larger system to make an appreciable difference to the swimming pool water. It will make some positive difference, but not a pronounced amount at these low levels. AOP stands for advanced oxidation potential or advanced oxidation process and much like the ozone system it benefits the water by oxidizing organic debris and contaminants. AOP systems generate hydroxyl radicals as their primary function and these are extremely reactive and highly effective as an oxidizing element in pool systems. Germicidal UV is slightly different than ozone and AOP which are both oxidizers. UV does not significantly oxidize the water. UV disinfects by photochemical damage to genetic material, not by oxidizing directly. So it does not remove contaminants via oxidation so much as it damages or destroys the DNA of contaminants like bacteria.
For more information you can check out this article about AOP systems in pools
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