Provide Safe Pool Sanitization

Proper sanitization of your pool's water is a crucial job, helping keep the water clean and clear, and protecting swimmers from potential illness. Managing pool chemicals can be hazardous, but there are ways to make the job safer and more manageable.

Q: What can we do to make pool sanitization more manageable?

A: You have two choices when it comes to on-site chlorine generation.

The first choice you should consider is a salt chlorine generator. Here's how it works: You add small amounts of salt as required to the pool. As the pool water flows through the salt chlorine generator cell, it uses an electric current between positively and negatively charged plates to create sodium hypochlorite, a form of chlorine, at near-neutral pH in a sufficient concentration to sanitize your pool's water.

Salt chlorine generation systems can be sized to produce the right amount of chlorine to meet the specific pool's needs.

Salt chlorine is generated at near pH-neutral, which means you'll need fewer chemicals to stabilize pH levels, reducing cost and hassle.

The second choice is to use a chlorine generator that uses the same principle described above, but you don't add salt to the pool. This technology uses salt that is stored in a vat to produce sodium hypochlorite, which is then injected to the pool.

Q: What should we know about chlorine and safety?

A: Bulk chlorine can present a number of cost and safety issues, which are eliminated with onsite chlorine generation. Bulk chlorine requires special hazmat trucks and special permits, as well as special storage facilities to reduce risk. Salt doesn't have these requirements. What's more, salt is more cost-effective, and its price tends to be more stable than the price for bulk chlorine.

Salt is also much safer to handle than bulk chlorine and the other chemicals associated with its use. When using bulk chlorine, pool owners and operators typically will add muriatic acid to the water to stabilize pH. Sometimes, the acid and chlorine are accidentally mixed, which can lead to fires or explosions. More often, accidents can create clouds of highly toxic chlorine gas, which can lead to respiratory problems and emergency medical response.