Culligan and Septic

[GaryQWA]

A septic tank is always as full as it can get. Add a gallon of water and a gallon exits the tank into the leach field. The leach field is supposed to allow the water to percolate down through the ground and drain away from the leach beds at an approved rate.

Septic systems that have not had grease, oils etc. that block this drainage, will not have a problem with the volume of water from even a very large softener, let alone a regular sized residential softener.

Over the last 18 years I've installed many pieces of water treatment equipment that dumps as much as 150 gallons into septic tanks and I've never had anyone say they had problems with that. Now if the septic system is in bad shape are you're having backups or slow draining problems, don't do it AND get the system fixed before it causes contamination of your own well. Or the neighbors' wells. if it hasn't already.

Most softeners will never add more water than say a tub bath or 2-3 showers or loads of laundry done one after the other, etc.. Or when the in-laws show up for a week....

Over the last 20 years there have been at least three sets of research done on this subject. The first 1-2 was responsible for a few of the states that had bans against softener discharge into their septic tanks to remove them. There are very few remaining bans.

Here's what the EPA has to say about the last research. The EPA also did the last research before this one.
http://www.epa.gov/ord/NRMRL/pubs/625r00008/html/fs3.htm

Here's a link to more info on this including how a septic tank system operates.
http://tinyurl.com/63bq7

Gary
Quality Water Associates

 

[srs]

Frank, my 2 cents here. My plumber added a neutralizer and water softener at my house here in MD. Everything is pumped into the septic system. He gave me the option during the backwashing phase to dump onto the lawn but that might kill the grass. Regular maintenance here on the septic. However only two of us here. Let us know.

 

[fenneran]

Gary: Thanks for the link and other info. With your years of experience, that gives me a lot of confidence.
srs: They are coming out tomorrow to install the system. I haven't seen anything in this thread so far that would cause me to change that.

Thanks all, this has been very helpful.

 

[GaryM]

GaryQWA,

Interesting links. I never realized that the backflush water from the softener contained little Sodium, but rather contained the Calcium and Magnesium. But when I think about it, it has to be that way. I have a WaterBoss unit and use Potassium Chloride rather than Sodium Chloride for two reasons. One was to reduce any extra Sodium from our diets, the other was to keep Sodium out of the septic system. Well, at least one odf those reasons is gone now! Any information on the other? I.E., how much Sodium does the softener add to the water? Any appreciable amount?

My plumber doesn't think too much of the WaterBoss, but one of the reasons I picked it was the 18 Gallon backflush.

 

[GaryQWA]

First the WaterBoss. On city water they seem to last maybe 5-6 years, on well waters, less.

Drain water from a filter or softener will kill grass if not due to sodium content, then because of the volume of water if regeneration or backwashing occurs more frequently than every 4+ days.

Most plumbers are great folks, but sad to say most usually don't know much about water treatment or the equipment my industry offers. Most do not know wells or pumps that well either.

The formula to determine the amount of added sodium by ion exchange softening your water is... 7.85 mg/l, roughly a quart, per gpg, grain per gallon, of exchange. I.E. 20 gpg hard water times 7.85 = 157 mg of added sodium if you drink the roughly quart of softened water.

The label on most loaves of white bread shows 150+/- sodium content. An 8 oz glass of skim milk, 530 mg and 560 for the same size V8 juice. So... many folks could drink their quart of softened water and eat one less slice of bread and less than a glass of skim milk or V8 juice and substantially REDUCE their sodium intake...

To substitute potassium chloride for softener salt, in high salt efficiency settings, you must increase the salt dose by up to 30%. Moderate salt efficiency settings require at least 6-12% higher. And it causes up to twice as much and can recrystallize in the salt tank, and that gets rock hard and causes more recrystallization due to the displaced water going up into the 'salt'. A vicious cycle that! And it causes you to have to clean the brine tank... and throw the hard (expensive) stuff away!

Solar crystal salt (sodium chloride) is best and is always the cheapest choice.

Now if they were really serious about their sodium intake, they'd also eat one less chip or other type snack food each evening and really reduce their sodium intake. BTW, a pickle usually has something like 1000 mg of sodium.

Here's some other foods, and don't forget, your unsoftened water has sodium in it too! Check the label or your water company web site or have a simple sodium test done on your raw well water.

Gary
Quality Water Associates