Water and Wastewater.com Help Forums - Remineralization of distilled drinking water

sca

YaBB Newbies

Offline

Water and
Wastewater.com is
the best!

Posts: 3

Remineralization of distilled drinking water
Apr 04^th, 2012, 1:31pm

Dear all,

I am a volunteer for a Belgian organisation (CATAPA) and we are currently supporting the development of solar distillation units in some rural areas in Bolivia to provide local families with potable water (which is now polluted due to mining activities). We already performed some tests on the distilled water and the distillation works very good. But we have some concerns regarding the low mineral content after distillation. Especially the Mg and Ca concentrations concern us (resp. <0.5 and <1mg/l), cause according to the WHO this should be much higher to avoid long term health risks (resp. >10 and >20mg/l is recomended).

So, now we are looking for solutions that are cheap and easy to control, cause this should be done by the local people themself. We already heard of mixing the distilled water with other water, but since all the water is contaminated (mainly with heavy metals) in some areas, this is doesn’t seem like a good solution. The most feasible solution seems to add lime stone, but we are not sure how this can be easily controlled in a way that the mineral content is always high enough.

Is there anyone here who has some experience in this matter or who can give some more advise or important things to consider in this regard? All additional information can be useful!

Thank you in advance!

Kind regards,
Sven

Back to top

IP Logged

DrHenry God Member Offline Ride, boldly ride, The shade replied... Posts: 788 Raleigh, NC Company or Organization: CESTAB (see bio)	Re: Remineralization of distilled drinking water Reply #1 - Apr 4^th, 2012, 1:50pm You might want to search the internet for a UK company that was selling packages, like sugar packets, that were used to flavor bottled water. The packets contained salts that were intended to return taste to bottled water. That might be an option. I'm sorry I can't remember the name.
Back to top	IP Logged

commissioning guy

Senior Member

Offline

I love Water and
Wastewater.com

Posts: 292

Company or Organization: SWS

Re: Remineralization of distilled drinking water
Reply #2 - Apr 4^th, 2012, 6:21pm

A simple remin vessel should sort out your problems. This is a vessel which contains limestone. It would have a bypass and you would pass some of the water through it and control the pH with passing the remainder of the water through the bypass. Check the pH of the treated water and you should have enough minerals in the water being dissolved via the remin vessel to sort out your problem.

Back to top

IP Logged

sca

YaBB Newbies

Offline

Water and
Wastewater.com is
the best!

Posts: 3

Re: Remineralization of distilled drinking water
Reply #3 - Apr 5^th, 2012, 10:46am

Thanks for the response so far. But the problem is that even the purchase of remineralization tablets or packages will probably be too expensive on a long term.
Also, the current design is very basic and consists of two storage tanks. The water evaporates in one tank, condensates on the roof and runs off to the second tank (gravitationally). So we could make the water run over a lime stone filter once, but I'm not sure if this would be enough for the remineralisation. Therefore we have been thinking of just placing some lime stone in the storage tank, but we also wonder if taht would be sufficient.

How critical is the pH of the water to make sure that enough minerals dissolve into the water? Cause we're not able to monitor or control this in the current situation.

Thanks guys!

Back to top

IP Logged

Jeff Naumann God Member Offline I love Water and Wastewater.com Posts: 1133 Torrance, California Gender: Company or Organization: Jeff Naumann & Associates	Re: Remineralization of distilled drinking water Reply #4 - Apr 5^th, 2012, 1:31pm How much water per day requires remineralization? How much variation per day in production of the water? How is the water distributed to the local people?
Back to top	IP Logged

sca

YaBB Newbies

Offline

Water and
Wastewater.com is
the best!

Posts: 3

Re: Remineralization of distilled drinking water
Reply #5 - Apr 10^th, 2012, 2:47pm

Sorry for the late respons, but I just recieved the additional information.

The water itself is not distibuted among the people, but every family has its own distillator. One distillator produces about 8-10 liters per day, and this is quite constant.

Hope this gives a better understanding of the situation.

Back to top

IP Logged

Jeff Naumann God Member Offline I love Water and Wastewater.com Posts: 1133 Torrance, California Gender: Company or Organization: Jeff Naumann & Associates	Re: Remineralization of distilled drinking water Reply #6 - Apr 10^th, 2012, 6:42pm Sorry, I made a mistake.
Back to top	IP Logged

sobisch

God Member

Offline

Posts: 1777

Gender: male

Company or Organization: L.U.M. GmbH

Re: Remineralization of distilled drinking water
Reply #7 - Apr 11^th, 2012, 1:26am

Due to mineral uptake from other sources there is no serious risk of consuming the distilled water itself.
Installation of a remineralization tank, however, would come with a serious risk of microbial contamination.
The best would be, if remineralization is a must, to distribute a powder mix of minerals of pharmaceutical quality mainly composed of Ca/Mg salts, maybe carbonates. Teas maybe better prepared from the distilled water directly.

Kind regards
T. Sobisch

Back to top

T. Sobisch
for@appliedcolloidssurfactants.info
http://AppliedColloidsSurfactants.blogspot.com
http://www.AppliedColloidsSurfactants.info
http://www.lum-gmbh.com

IP Logged