How Do Ion Exchange Water Softeners Work?

The process of ion exchange softens water as the minerals that cause limescale from hard water are extracted.

In order to understand its chemical process and various benefits, it’s important to understand what ion exchange resin is. These are small synthetic polymeric beads that can remove unwanted ions from a liquid through the process of exchanging ions.

It’s commonly used for Water Treatment in water softening but may be used for purifying chemicals in laboratories, demineralisation and other industrial purposes.

For an ion exchange water softener, the process is as follows:

The Softening Cycle

Beginning in the resin tank, the resin beads will attract the hard water minerals and replace them with Sodium or Potassium ions – it will then not build on the surface as scale deposits. Here, the sodium ions are negatively charging the resin beads.
Once the beads become saturated with calcium and magnesium ions, they can not continue to soften the water so regeneration is needed. For this to happen, the ion exchange resin is then flushed with salt brine solution.
The potassium or sodium ions then replace the calcium and magnesium with the latter being flushed out along with wastewater. The resin has now been recharged with sodium ions. We refer to this stage as the Regeneration Cycle.

Why would a household use one?

Simply put, it’s about preventing a build-up of scale. Limescale that accumulates in your pipes can ultimately reduce your water flow – so what does this mean? Higher energy costs.

To combat this, we remove the calcium and magnesium ions through an ion Exchange Water Softener system!

Benefits of an Ion Exchange Water Softener

The water softening process through ion exchange can remove almost all of magnesium and calcium from the water.

Using water softeners for home use will yield results from appliances having a longer life span to reducing the mineral build up on your hair – reducing the dryness and contributing more to your hair health than hard water.

It isn’t just yourself that can gain an advantage from softened water. Your appliances will thank you too as less scale building up will reduce the need for appliances to be replaced for damage from under-deposit corrosion and overheating. Remember, the minerals in the hard water can react with the metals so preventing corrosion can go a long way in increasing the lifespan of appliances.

As the minerals in hard water react with soap, an insoluble residue known as soap scum can really inhibit the lathering and cleaning power. This occurs due to the suspended mineral reacting with soaps organic acid, thus producing calcium/magnesium salts. So, you use more of the products to make up for the diminished ability of the soap. An ion exchange water softener in your house will go a long way in preventing this, so you can enjoy less refills and save money over time.

Not only this, stains on your glasses/cutlery are less likely to occur as limescale stops being built up.

Now that calcium is being removed, the boiling point of the water will decrease so you can find the time taken to heat water will go down – thereby saving you on energy consumption.

Limitations

It is important to note that though this is a good water treatment for softening of the water itself, it does not eliminate silt, sand, pesticides, bacteria, hydrogen sulphide, lead, nitrate and similar contaminants.

Of course, it is worth noting that there is wastewater production as a result of the regeneration stage for an ion exchange water softener, so this “brine” will need to be properly disposed of. As such, there is environmental risk here with this process. Disposing of this and maintenance for the whole system should also be taken into consideration when weighing up this option of incorporating this set up as part of your water treatment.

Resin Products will be able to provide you with suitable inline filter cartridges such as Softening Iron Reduction that are designed for a low-flow, point-of-use filtration. Softening cartridges available here may be requested with a quote application.

Summary

Overall, the ion exchange process can help provide water that is softer and have widespread use for water softening. For domestic purposes, it is a good long-term strategy to combat the need to replace appliances and as such, can result in savings being made as the lifespan of your appliances increases and you spend less money and time on cleaning.