“Always learn poems by heart. They have to become the marrow in your bones. Like fluoride in the water, they’ll make your soul impervious to the world’s soft decay.” – Janet Fitch

Overview

Fluoride is naturally present in many water sources and readily interacts with calcium in the body, affecting bones and teeth. Elevated concentrations can lead to dental fluorosis in children and, at higher levels, skeletal fluorosis characterized by bone brittling and joint stiffness.To protect public health, fluoride levels in drinking water must be carefully controlled. The USEPA has established a maximum contaminant level (MCL) of 4 mg/L, with an optimal target of approximately 2 mg/L to balance health benefits and risks.

Pureflow Treatment Technology

Activated Alumina Adsorption

The Pureflow fluoride removal process includes a unique, highly porous activated alumina media that is physically and chemically stable. It has large surface areas and a high porosity that makes it an excellent adsorbent. The media is chemically inert to all but the most corrosive gases and liquids, and resists abrasion and disintegration.Well water containing fluoride is chemically pretreated to adjust the pH. At the optimum fluoride removal pH, some organic molecules and some trace heavy metals, including arsenic, are adsorbed on the media.

Automatic pH control ensures optimum chemical pretreatment. Fluoride ions are attracted and held to vast surface areas throughout the pores of the activated alumina, and fluoride removal is achieved.When the activated alumina bed has removed the maximum amount of fluoride, it requires regeneration to remove the fluoride from the media. The bed is backwashed to remove suspended solids. Next, the bed is treated with caustic solution to dissolve fluoride from the media. The bed is then flushed with raw water to remove excess caustic solution and neutralize the bed.