DRINKING my pool water

[hamlet]

I've been drinking my pool water, er, and showering in it too. Well, not exactly, here's my situation:

I live in Hawaii in an area with no municipal water. We catch our water from the roof, store it in a tank, then pump it into the house.

It seems to me that the BBB method, with additional filtration would be the best practice for safe drinking water.

I'm using calcium hydrochloride (HTH product), baking soda, and carbon filtration. I test at the tank and the tap, after the sub-micron carbon filter. (UV is not an option, nor Ozone, or gizmo's that requires electricity.)

My question is what is the most shelf-stable product for chlorination? I can't use household bleach, as by the time it gets to the store shelves, it's too weak to do anything, so I've switch to HTH. However, as I understand it, HTH loses 8% strength each year. I don't like that, for many reasons. Is there calcium hydrochloride product in tablet form that has better shelf stability?

[PoolDoc]

I would suggest you try to contact Olin's drinking water sanitation people directly. I know that they've done some research in that area. You might also want to check how other areas of the world do what you are doing. I believe it may be common in some parts of Australia.

I'm not sure why losing 8% strength in a calcium hypochlorite would be a problem however. Also, I don't understand how you are mixing a carbon filter with chlorine. Carbon filters remove chlorine.

I'm not even sure why you are chlorinating. If you are actually doing sub-micron filtration, I'm not sure what the point is, unless some avian virus endemic to your area can be transmitted in bird feces.

Sincerely,

Ben Powell

[BigDave]

It makes sense to me. He's keeping the reserve of collected water sanitary prior to final filtration / polish.