Moving From a Cistern to Well Water

This is an update to the family I mentioned June 26th, "Well Water vs Cistern Water" - they decided to go ahead with the treatment system and take their cistern offline.

Douglas Environmental closed off their cistern, just before their next scheduled water delivery (instant savings of $60!) and tied their well into the plumbing servicing the entire home. The water from this well wasn't particularly nice to start with - it has very hard (17 grains or almost 300 mg/L hardness) and had problems with iron, sulfur (or sulphur, if you prefer) and some tannins and organics that would be causing staining.

This called for two separate units to treat the water for the whole home, and a reverse osmosis (RO) system to supply pure, fresh drinking water to the kitchen faucet, a faucet in the basement and to the fridge & icemaker for chilled water and perfect ice. We ended up softening and sediment filtering the water in the first stage of treatment - for this, we used the "Puratech" system from Hague Quality Water followed in series by a special carbon filter unit that would handle the tannins, organics and H2S gas (sulfur - causing the "rotten egg odour" many well water families are familiar with.)

The family had a sink in the basement where they plan on making wine. It was determined the best place to install the RO system was under the basement sink, feeding a faucet right there for purified water, then run a line upstairs to feed the kitchen's RO faucet and the fridge. Normally, we install the RO completely out of the way, in the utility room where the pressure tank and any well water treatment equipment would be, but logistically, this time installing under the sink seemed to make the most sense.

After the transition was complete, the home actually had better water from the system than was being supplied to any city water home. Their well supplies LOTS of clean, fresh water now - and the organic staining most cistern owners deal with is a thing of the past. Other than the power to run their well pump, something still required with a cistern, the water is "free" to use now.

Unlike a cistern where rationing drives people crazy, not to mention the $120+ per month for water hauling, there is very little for this family to do or think about when it comes to their water. Monthly, they are to check salt levels on the conditioner and annually, there is a maintenance required on the drinking water system - something recommended even if they were to stay with the cistern, since that water is immediately stale and contaminated with dust, dirt, organics and often even with frogs and mice. (Yuck!)

Now the water is fresh and free-flowing. The way it should be!