Is Parkland water safe to drink? While contaminant levels may be below legal limits, that doesn’t mean contaminants can’t pose a threat to your health. Recent tests have detected the presence of harmful chemicals in Parkland’s tap water.
This article will discuss:
Some water comes from private wells, but much of it comes from several plants that treat groundwater before disseminating it throughout Parkland. For water treatment as well as sewage management, Parkland’s water departments include the City of Coconut Creek, the North Springs Improvement District, Parkland Utilities and South Florida Water Management. Parkland’s water companies share the burden of taking care of local water.
To treat water is not to free it from contaminants. Filtering water is expensive, so municipalities simply inject chlorine into it to clean it instead. Injecting chlorine into the water is better than nothing, but this process still leaves behind a lot of contaminants.
For water across the country, hardness is one of the most immediate problems beside general contamination. How can water be hard? “Hardness” refers to the amount of sediment that has dissolved into the water. This sediment can cause a lot of problems, including:
At 72.5 PPM (mg/L), Parkland’s water is moderately hard, containing four particles of sediment per gallon of water. Parkland’s residents receive all their water from underground, so they might benefit from a reduction in water hardness.
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) conducts regular tests on water samples throughout the country to determine whether contamination exceeds legal limits. Not only do legal limits fail to be strict enough to guarantee safety, but the EPA hasn’t updated its limits in over 20 years.
Picking up the EPA’s slack, the Environmental Working Group (EWG) holds the same tests to higher standards in the interest of human health. These stricter guidelines underscore the importance of clean water and highlight the presence of excess contaminants. All contamination is bad, but the EWG has detected in particular excess contaminants that reflect the origin of Parkland’s water. Data from 2014 through 2019 suggests the following:
| CONTAMINANT | TOTAL |
EWG RECOMMENDED
|
| Haloacetic Acids (HAA5) | 18 ppb | 0.1 ppb |
| Radium-226 and -228 | 1.1 pCi/L | 0.05 pCi/L |
| Total Trihalomethanes (TTHMs) | 10.3 ppb | 0.15 ppb |
HAA5s are carcinogenic byproducts of water treatment that potentially cause bladder, rectal and colon cancers. They can also cause birth defects in children whose mothers consume the water. Injecting disinfectants, like chlorine, into a water supply will create HAA5s. Federal standards regulate these products, though they’re not healthy to ingest in the first place.
This carcinogenic, radioactive element is especially likely to cause bone cancer. It occurs naturally in groundwater across the planet. With all of its sediment, the hardest water is the likeliest carrier of radium. Disinfectant may remove bacteria, but it can’t remove radioactive isotopes.
TTHMs are further carcinogenic byproducts of water treatment, potentially causing cancer of the bladder, rectum and colon as HAA5s do. It also leads to birth defects among children. Injecting chlorine among other disinfectants into water will yield TTHMs. Again, the federal government explicitly allows for these TTHMs because water treatment is better than nothing.
In addition to these primary contaminants above safe limits, the EWG has discovered several other contaminants in Parkland’s water:
While these contaminants exceed neither the EWG’s limits nor the EPA’s limits, no contamination is healthy. To learn more about Parkland’s water, please visit the EWG’s page for the area.
There’s no single solution to all homes’ water problems. Best options will vary from house to house.
The first step is to recognize which contaminants are in your water. Only after you do this can you begin to look for an in-house water system that makes the most sense.
Here are the major steps you can take to keep your water clean:
A test is the only way to discern what’s in your water. We can help you conduct an EPA-certified water test to reveal the precise contaminants in your home’s water. Based on what the test uncovers, we can point you toward next steps.
Because Florida receives its drinking water from underground, your water might exhibit high hardness. If this is the case, you’ll benefit the most from a salt-based water softener. Water softeners take advantage of ion exchange to remove sediment from incoming water.
Also, because the sediment contains the radium, water softeners kill two birds with one stone, reducing hardness and contamination. Note the key difference between salt-free and salt-based water softeners: Salt-free softeners only condition the water to keep it from sticking to pipes, reducing neither hardness nor radium saturation. You’ll need to refill a salt-based water softener with large bags of salt, but it is the better option.
The best salt-based water softeners are under the PurASoft brand. These softeners maintain NSF 44 certification, which means that extensive testing has promised their effectiveness.
If contaminants are a bigger threat to you than water hardness, reverse osmosis (RO) systems are among the best methods for genuinely filtering a residence’s water. Installing one of these is a great way to remove:
How does it work? An RO system forces water through a semipermeable membrane that traps contaminants while allowing pure water to enter the home. However, water naturally contains minerals that help the body, like fluoride and magnesium, so RO systems reinject good materials back into the “pure” water.
As the best water softeners have NSF 44 certification, the best RO systems have NSF 58 certification. A set of tests has made sure these RO systems can do their jobs as effectively as possible.
The great product you purchase can go to waste without proper installation. The slightest misstep could cause a leak that’d make you and your family sick. Hiring a licensed plumber can make sure your in-house water system does what it’s supposed to do. Most manufacturers require annual maintenance for customers to keep warranties, so be sure to have professional plumbers install and maintain your device to maximize benefits.
With any luck, you’ve learned a thing or two about water in Parkland, FL. Don’t settle for carcinogenic water that could make you or your family sick. We can help you test your water and find the right solution to whatever the test reveals.
Angel Water has been helping homeowners clean their water for 50 years. With our great track record, we know we can help you. Our licensed plumbers would be happy to test your water and point you toward the right RO system or water softener. Our premier installation and maintenance services can keep your systems running smoothly.
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If you want to understand the quality of the water your family depends on everyday, contact us today. One of our representatives is standing by to help you schedule your free water test. We’ll send one of our local water expert to test the water at your tap and explain common problems and solutions for your specific water composition so that you can rest easy, knowing that your family is drinking the healthiest water possible.
