Buying RO / DI - I know nothing

[Ron99]

Originally Posted by RuGlu6

its Not the water in the gut that absorbs minerals, its what body will do to survive.
For example body will draw calcium from bones if blood has less then enough of calcium for proper hart beat rate.Why ? because hart is more important for survival the bones at the moment.
You can drink 0ppm water for long time without any ill effect, what body will do is it will take required minerals from whatever source available; food veggies etc. or other body parts if levels are critically low.
The point is to supply natural (Not synthetic) minerals to the body at regular intervals.
So yes tap water is OK to drink. RO/DI is OK to drink IF you have enough minerals in perfect proportions, but what we know in this hobby is that, if you don't test it you don't know where you at right?
jmtcw

You are right about what your body will do if you have low serum calcium but wrong about what role ro/di water can play. Sorry. The recommendation is that daily calcium intake be around 1000 mg/day. Our water on the west coast is pretty soft so calcium levels in the Vancouver area average around 1.4 mg/L. Areas with very hard water can be up to around 135 mg/L. Most spring water is around 20 mg/L. Mineral waters are higher and average around 200 mg/L. So to get your full calcium from lower mainland tap water you would have to drink over 700 liters every day. With the best mineral waters and given average water intake you could possibly get 40% of your calcium from drinking water. The majority of our calcium and other minerals come from the food we eat. Average daily intake of water is less than 2 liters. So in the lower mainland you are possibly getting 2 to 3 mg of calcium per day from your drinking water, or 2% of your daily intake. So a 2% reduction from drinking ro/di will make no real difference. If you are getting adequate minerals from your food or vitamin supplements then drinking RO/DI water will not change that. The minerals get absorbed by your body and used. If your diet is low in those minerals you probably won't get enough from drinking water to make up the difference unless you are drinking several liters of mineral water each day. You are better off talking a vitamin supplement etc. if you need it.

The type of water you drink will make no difference whatsoever. You are either getting enough in your diet or not. RO/DI wayter cannot and will not pull minerals from your body. It just isn't possible.

Also, I have seen people argue that ro/di water is acidic and therefor bad for you. While true in relation to regular tap water it is not a big deal. I believe ro/di water can get down to pH 6.0 or so by absorbing atmospheric CO2. However, compare this to stuff like pop or citrus juices and they are more acidic than ro/di water so that argument doesn't hold water either (sorry for the pun).

Anyhow, sorry if I sound confrontational. I just get irked by conclusions based on poor science, pseudo science or or just plain wrong information.

[pterfloth]

As an industrial and municipal water treatment consultant I just had to chime in. RO and DI water are fine to drink, they just taste flat. Your body does not rely on minerals in water for nutrition. A single piece of toast has many times the number of minerals several gallons of water has.

RO is used all over the world to produce fresh drinking water from seawater. Many of the bottled water companies use RO pretreatment.

GVRD water has the lowest concentration of dissolved minerals in North America. The need for RO here is marginal at best.

[fkshiu]

Originally Posted by Myka

You do know that RO/DI water isn't suitable for drinking, right? You have to unhook the DI part to just get RO for drinking, and buy the drinking water add-on. You can buy a pressure tank so you get RO water on demand, then just hook up the DI part when you want to make water for your reef. Or you can just use the 20 litre jugs (which are actually 5g, not 6).

All you need is a t-connector to divert the RO water through a "taste" cartridge for drinking water - dead simple. I've installed my RO/DI under the kitchen sink upstairs connected to a tap. I run another line downstairs to laundry room within reach of the aquarium.

As mentioned, you can drink RO/DI to your heart's content. It just tastes bad which is the reason why household units have that taste cartridge which is usually filled with coconut husks. The DI water is instantly re-mineralized when it hits your saliva in any event. It's not some kind of vampire water that'll suck you dry. That misconception comes from the fact that you should NOT keep DI water in a metal container. It will react with the metal and cause rust in the container and contamination of the water.

[Snaz]

Thanks for the help guys. Looking further into that Costco link Macky provided I came across this interesting fact.

"While standard reverse osmosis systems waste 15 or more litres (4 gallons) per every 4 litres (1 gallon) produced. The new patented "Zero Waste" reverse osmosis system wastes no water. "
http://www.costco.ca/Browse/Product....835&lang=en-CA

Is this correct, how do standard RO units waste water? Surrey residents are metered for water use so wasting four gallons to produce one seems costly and not very "green".

[hillegom]

I see that link to costco has a pic of the unit. This is a new system and I have not seen one yet. I guess it doesn't waste water as it uses the pump, electrically operated, to push all the water through the RO membrane. But this would coat the membrane with all the "bad" molecules you would normally pass out to the drain. So I would check to see how long of a life the membrane is rated for.
Normaly, Ro units make one gallon of good water and 4 gal down the drain. This will flush all the bad things down the drain, and this will lengthen the life of the RO membrane .
You could always plumb the drain water outside and water the lawn. Good only in the summer though!

[macky]

The Watts RO zero waste system sends the waste water into the hot water line to be used for washing clothes, showering, etc. The bad part is that it only makes RO water when it is able the send the waste water into the hot water line(hot water has to be on and running). Therefore, the amount of RO water produced depends on how much hot water you use.
I chose to buy the one that wastes because I didn't think that the amount of RO water produced by the zero waste model would be enough for all my drinking water and tank water.

[Myka]

If you guys really believe RO or even RO/DI water is ok to drink, go check out what the World Health Organisation says about it.

[subman]

After reading as much as I could take and then trying to navigate the WHO website. I can't see any where that says Ro water bad! RO/Di on the other hand seems to be a great debate and after further understanding why it's bad for us, it make me not want to use it at all for my tanks or anything for that matter.