Background
There are billions and billions of gallons of water that is backwashed out of sand filtered swimming pools and into sensitive farmland groundwater aquifers, waterways and oceans each year. Unfortunately, that discharged water is contaminated with chemicals, salt, and metals, all of which are toxic to both plants and animals. This combined with an ever-growing population and the demand for clean water increasing, the need to protect and conserve water is critical.
DON'T LOSE IT
Re-USE IT!
The flushout process when using a sand filter can discharge up to 200 gallons of water per cleaning. The crazy thing is that those 200 gallons of water are 99% clear with only a small amount of dirt in suspended turbidity. Then an additional 200 gallons of fresh water has to be added to top up the pool. That’s a colossal and tragic amount of waste.
That water originated from our already limited fresh water supply. It was then treated at a water plant, and treated again with costly chemicals once it’s been placed into a pool. Many people may have even used a fossil fuel heater or electricity to pump it through a solar system, heating it to a higher temperature during the colder months. But within a couple of minutes, applying a backwash process, that precious water is washed down the drain.
TRANSFORMING WATER USE TO
SUSTAIN OUR FUTURE
Let’s examine the scope of this problem. In the Western U.S. alone, there are more than 1 million pools with sand filters. Take just the previously mentioned 200 gallons of water wasted and multiply it by 25 backwashes per year; that adds up to FIVE BILLION gallons of wasted water, every year. That’s enough water for 100 million people to take a bath!…..Wait you have to top up the pool, add another FIVE BILLION gallons!
SAVE WATER
TIME & MONEY
Cartridge filters degrade over time, meaning they lose their effectiveness and will eventually have to be replaced, which is both good and bad. While replacing the filter gets rid of biofilm that could live in the filter, it means the cartridges get dumped in the landfills. Taking up to 200 years to deteriorate and degrade, nearly 1 million pool filter cartridges wind up in landfills per year in California alone, and they’re full of chemicals, biofilm, salts and copper-laden toxic solids.
There are a number of important environmental, ecological and economic advantages of the BeST Clear System. The recommended filtration media to use in The BeST Clear System process is Activated Filter Media, or AFM made by Dryden Aqua. AFM has been proven effective in more than 500,000 pools around the world, and is a highly engineered product made from a specific type of glass to achieve optimum particle size and shape.
HEALTH IS
WEALTH
One of the main differences between AFM and other filter media is that it provides bio-resistance. After six to 12 months, biofilm in a sand filter has gathered to a point where the grains stick together, leading to the formation of clumps which causes channeling of the filter bed. That will reduce filtration performance and allow unfiltered and biofouled water to reach your friends and family using the pool, that’s not healthy.
BeST CLEAR SYSTEM
DIFFERENCE
Using an Activated Filter Media has been scientifically engineered with a self-sterilizing surface, it impedes biofouling which prevents the channeling common in sand filters. The AFM’s patented activation process increases the surface area of the media, resulting in superior absorption rates, down to one micon. A BeST Clear System with AFM has the ability to remove 50% more organic substances from the water than sand or other glass filter media. Additionally, with AFM, there is no biological conversion from urea to ammonia inside your filter. No biofilm…no trichloramine…no chlorine smell.
AFM’s superior filtration properties means up to 50% less backwash water than a sand filter and about 20% shorter backwash times. The BeST Clear System with AFM filtration is clearly the best way to keep a swimming pool sparkling clean and help preserve our precious water supply.
