Core guide
How to Choose a Home Water Filtration System
Build the decision from the source, concern, treatment location, verified claim, and long-term service plan.
Read the guide →Resources
Home Water Education Library
Clear definitions, direct answers, comparison questions, checklists, and maintenance guidance for homeowners who want to understand a system before buying it.
How to use this library
Begin with the question you are trying to answer. Use source records and property information first. Choose testing only when it can answer what remains unknown. Compare treatment by exact purpose, complete model claim, operating limits, ownership cost, and maintenance.
Start here
Core water treatment guides
Core guide
How to Compare Water Treatment Quotes
Compare evidence, model numbers, scope, ownership cost, warranties, and post-installation verification.
Read the guide →Core guide
How to Read a Drinking Water Quality Report
Understand system-level reporting and what it does not say about a specific property or fixture.
Read the guide →Core guide
Private Well Water Testing
Plan raw-water sampling, laboratory methods, well inspection, and follow-up.
Read the guide →Core guide
How Reverse Osmosis Works
Understand prefilters, membrane separation, storage, drain flow, and maintenance.
Read the guide →Core guide
How a Water Softener Works
Understand ion exchange, capacity, regeneration, salt efficiency, and service flow.
Read the guide →Core guide
Activated Carbon Water Filters
Learn what carbon can address, what it cannot, and why contact time and capacity matter.
Read the guide →Core guide
Verify Water Filter Certification
Check the certification body, standard, complete model, exact claim, and operating conditions.
Read the guide →Core guide
Water Filter Troubleshooting Guide
Use pressure, flow, valve, cartridge, leak, and maintenance clues in a logical order.
Read the guide →Core guide
Water Treatment Commissioning Checklist
Document startup, settings, pressure, flushing, leak checks, and baseline performance.
Read the guide →Core guide
Lead in Drinking Water
Separate source, service-line, premise-plumbing, sampling, treatment, and correction questions.
Read the guide →Core guide
PFAS in Drinking Water
Ask the right testing, complete-system, capacity, and maintenance questions.
Read the guide →Expanded education center
Detailed system design, maintenance, and buyer guides
These new pages expand the library with practical questions that homeowners often discover only after equipment is installed.
New homeowner guide
Water Pressure and Whole-House Filtration: What Homeowners Should Check
Learn how incoming pressure, peak flow, pipe size, and filter pressure drop affect whole-house water filtration planning.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
Sediment Filter Micron Ratings Explained
Understand nominal versus absolute micron ratings, staged sediment filtration, pressure drop, and replacement planning.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
Carbon Filter Capacity, Contact Time, and Breakthrough
Learn why carbon type, bed depth, flow, capacity, and replacement timing matter in water filtration.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
When to Replace a Reverse Osmosis Membrane
Use performance data, not guesswork, to plan reverse osmosis membrane replacement and troubleshooting.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
Reverse Osmosis Product Water and Reject Water Ratios
Understand reverse osmosis recovery, reject water, pressure, membrane production, and efficiency claims.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
Water Softener Sizing: Hardness Load, Capacity, and Flow
Learn how hardness, iron, household demand, resin capacity, regeneration settings, and peak flow affect softener sizing.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
Why Water Softener Salt Use Changes
Understand how hardness, water use, capacity settings, reserve, leaks, and regeneration affect softener salt consumption.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
Brine Tank Cleaning and Salt Bridge Prevention
A homeowner guide to brine-tank inspection, salt bridging, mush, cleaning, and safe softener restart.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
Water Softener Resin Life and Performance
Learn what affects ion-exchange resin life, how performance is evaluated, and when cleaning or replacement may be considered.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
Water Treatment Bypass Valves: Purpose, Placement, and Testing
Understand why bypass valves matter for service, emergencies, sampling, and troubleshooting.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
How to Diagnose Pressure Drop Across a Whole-House Filter
A practical pressure-drop troubleshooting sequence for cartridge filters, media tanks, valves, and household plumbing.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
Point-of-Use vs. Point-of-Entry Water Treatment
Compare treatment at one tap with whole-home treatment by goal, flow, cost, maintenance, and verified performance.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
Total Dissolved Solids (TDS): What the Number Can and Cannot Tell You
Understand TDS meters, conductivity, dissolved ions, reverse osmosis monitoring, and the limits of a single number.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
Chlorine vs. Chloramine: Why Treatment Design Can Differ
Learn why disinfectant type, contact time, carbon media, flow, and complete-system claims matter.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
Ultraviolet (UV) Water Treatment: Pretreatment, Dose, and Maintenance
Understand how UV systems work, why water clarity matters, and what lamps, sleeves, sensors, and testing require.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
Nitrate in Private Well Water: Testing and Treatment Questions
A cautious homeowner guide to nitrate sampling, source investigation, reverse osmosis, ion exchange, and verification.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
Private Well Bacteria Testing: Sampling, Results, and Follow-Up
Learn how to prepare a private-well bacteria sample, avoid contamination, interpret the lab report, and plan follow-up.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
Arsenic in Home Water: Treatment Planning Without Guesswork
Understand why arsenic testing, species, water chemistry, complete-system claims, and verification matter.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
Manganese Staining: Testing, Oxidation, Filtration, and Maintenance
A homeowner guide to dark staining, manganese testing, treatment sequence, and media maintenance.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
New-Home Water Assessment Checklist
A move-in checklist for source records, plumbing, fixtures, water heaters, existing filters, testing, and maintenance history.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
Older-Home Plumbing and Water Quality Questions
Learn how service lines, premise plumbing, fixtures, water heaters, and renovations can affect water observations.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
Vacation-Home and Seasonal Water Treatment Maintenance
Plan shutdown, stagnation, freezing protection, sanitizing, restart, and service records for seasonal properties.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
Water Treatment Installation-Day Checklist
A homeowner checklist for equipment verification, plumbing layout, bypasses, drains, power, flushing, commissioning, and records.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
Build a Water Treatment Maintenance Calendar
Create a practical schedule for filters, softeners, reverse osmosis, UV, media tanks, testing, and annual review.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
How to Compare Water Treatment Service Plans
Compare included labor, parts, emergency response, exclusions, testing, cancellation, and long-term ownership cost.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
Whole-House Water Filtration: Rental vs. Purchase
Compare ownership, rental terms, maintenance, removal, total cost, transfer, and equipment rights.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
Water Treatment Questions to Ask Before Signing
A final comparison checklist for evidence, model numbers, claims, installation, maintenance, warranties, and payment terms.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
Water Heater Odor vs. Source-Water Odor
Learn how hot-only odor, anodes, stagnation, plumbing, and source-water sulfur questions are separated.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
Filter Housing Size, Port Size, and Household Flow
Compare cartridge length, diameter, port size, flow, dirt capacity, and service clearance.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
Water Filter Leak Prevention and Response Plan
Plan shutoffs, bypasses, supports, pressure control, leak sensors, service technique, and emergency response.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
Water Treatment Equipment and Septic-System Planning
Understand regeneration discharge, backwash flow, salt, drain routing, local requirements, and septic loading.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
Well Pressure Tanks and Water Treatment System Design
Learn how pump cycling, pressure switch settings, drawdown, backwash demand, and treatment placement interact.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
Water Treatment Checks After Plumbing Repairs
A post-repair plan for flushing, sediment, disinfection, filter loading, leaks, pressure, and baseline records.
Read the guide →New homeowner guide
Water Treatment for Ice Makers and Refrigerators
Plan pressure, flow, tubing, filter compatibility, reverse osmosis connection, sanitation, and maintenance.
Read the guide →Visual learning
Use the visual water guides.
Short visual guides turn testing, maintenance, public-water, private-well, and contaminant questions into practical reminders.
Blog & Water News
New: Louisville water-quality investigations
Ten source-linked articles examine GenX, PFAS rules, prescription residues, estrogen, ibuprofen, wastewater drug markers, report limitations, and certified treatment claims.
Louisville’s GenX Spike: What the 52-ppt Raw-Water Reading Really Means
Louisville detected a 15-fold GenX spike in untreated Ohio River water in December 2024. See what was found, what treatment changed, and what homeowners can do.
Read the evidence →
Can GenX Cause Cancer? What EPA’s Science Actually Says
EPA animal studies associate GenX exposure with cancer and other effects. Learn what that hazard finding does—and does not—mean for Louisville families.
Read the evidence →
EPA’s 2026 PFAS Rule Proposals: Why GenX Still Matters in Louisville
EPA proposed major PFAS drinking-water rule changes in 2026. See what could change for PFOA, PFOS, GenX, PFNA, PFHxS, and Louisville homeowners.
Read the evidence →