Ultra Violet UV

Using ultra violet to sterilise bacteria, began in the 1960’s and later on Atlantic, Trojan and Wedeco developed commercial systems.  Due to it’s success, affordable ultra violet systems became available, recommended by health authorities for safe bacterial sterilisation of contaminated supplies.

Ultra violet has now become the safest and most effective form of bacterial disinfection available, with working efficiences of up to 99.999999%.  Allowing a calculated flow of infected water to be passed in contact with a high intensity ultra violet (UV) light source deactivates the reproductive dna of viruses, bacteria and cysts, rendering them harmless and causing subsequent cell death.

Modern ultra violet disinfection systems are used on domestic wells. Ultra violet (UV) lamp life is 12 months ensuring optimum sterilisation witha ballasts that allow audible and visual warnings in case of ultra violet lamp failure. For peace of mind, ultra violet systems can be upgraded to double the kill rate.

Ultra violet disinfection systems for household use typically operate on a power usage of around 20 to 40 watts and require a new lamp every 12 months along with a 5 micron prefilter cartridge.  Ultra violet steriliser systems work best on water free of water hardness, colour, turbidity and insolubles that obstruct the transmission of ultra violet rays.  Unless water is naturally soft, sourced from a granite rock area, a water softener will soften any level of scaling especially hardness levels above 50 ppm.

Health authorities rate safe levels of contamination as less than 1 organism in 10 litres of mains water with bacteriocidal units being effective above the 99.95 % sterilisation range. When levels of contamination are recorded in a water supply by measuring an average level of pathogens per litre of water, it becomes easy to calculate a safe threshold for drinking use.  If a mains water scheme has established a good track record of disinfection using modern treatment, the level of post treatment at domestic level should be able to be kept to a minimum.