Pure H2O-Reverse
osmosis
Your
mains or private tap water may contain chlorine and a variety of dissolved
minerals and metals, including iron, nitrates, chlorides and sodium. The
water picks up most of these as rain water runs over and through
the land, and some (in particular chlorine) are added by water companies.
Reverse osmosis is
the optimum way to rid your water of these impurities. The RO system will
remove approximately 95% of the contaminants in water, such as chlorine,
lead, fluorides, bacteria, viruses and unpleasant tastes and odours. RO
water is used in many different applications from Dental surgery to smear
free window cleaning.
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If
you separate a solution of salts from pure water using a basic
semi-permeable membrane, like a sausage skin, the pure water passes
through the membrane and tries to dilute the salt solution. If the salt
solution is connected to a vertical pipe then the progressively diluted
solution will fill the pipe until the ‘osmotic pressure’ drawing the
pure water through the membrane is the same as the head pressure of the
diluted solution.
This process can be reversed hence ‘reverse osmosis’ by applying a
higher pressure to the salt solution. Pure water will then pass the other
way through the membrane in a process that is easy to visualize as
filtration where the filter will only let through the small water
molecules and retain almost all the other molecules. This means that water
containing a high level of natural salts can be purified without the need
for chemical regenerates, such as acid or caustic. Filterclean supply and
install reverse osmosis systems for home users, pubs, restaurants, window
cleaners and
larger industrial concerns.
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