Water treatment - How to treat water per CDC guidelines and a look at what we did to our water supply

Currently here at Ecodale, we have a 2550 gallon tank of water.  Right now we were down to 300 gallons as of yesterday, and had a delivery brought in by Agua Dulce out of Dripping Springs.  Currently we pay $280 for that delivery per our agreement that has been ongoing for years now.  So if you contact them and there are different rates, I cannot comment on that at this time. 

After the delivery, the tank was at 2200+ gallons.  Last night after I let the water settle down and it appears slightly cloudy.  So I let it sit overnight since I had things to do, and I would address the next morning.  That would be this morning.

So I went and got the bleach, and did some math per the CDC guidelines.  I checked the tap water and it appears very clear.  Not cloudy at the tap, but slightly cloudy in the tank.  Based on these observations, I determined that we would go with the CDC recommendation of:

If tap water is clear: 1. Use bleach that does not have an added scent (like lemon). 2. Add 1/8 teaspoon (8 drops or about 0.75 milliliters) of household liquid bleach to 1 gallon (16 cups) of water. 3. Mix well and wait 30 minutes or more before drinking.

With that said, the equation of 2200 gallons x .75 millileters = 55.79314 US fluid ounces.  So I used the 2.5 or so cups of concentrated bleach (a little over 8%) that we had left.  Then I topped to the 3 cup line with regular or 6% bleach.  Then another 3 cups of the regular bleach and then 1 more cup of regular bleach again.  My vessel for measuring is 3 cups, so that is how I was able to break down what I measured.  In total, there was 56 US fluid ounces of bleach into the 2200 gallons.  I expect that in the morning the water should be clear and may have a slight smell of bleach for a day or two.  But with the sun and texas warmth, most of that evaporates off quite quickly.  It is difficult to stir such a large vessel of water, but the last times we did this the next day it was clear that bleach does resolve issues of algae in the tank.  I will regroup and comment back after I check again tomorrow.  Here is a video I snapped while I was up on the tank today.  Also I have placed a link to the CDC PDF on "Make Water Safe" below the video.  Feel free to use this as reference, as it is directly from the Centers for Disease Control, not something I created.



CDC guidelines - Make Water Safe

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