Kati Ani De-Ionizer

[deano]

Is anyone out there using a Kati Ani De-ionizer rather than an RO/DI water filter. Apparently the former doesn't waste grotesque amounts of water like an RO/DI unit. I don't know if they are sold in Canada or not...

[hillbillyreefer]

Never heard of it. Could you post a link, new ideas are great!!

[Canuckgod420]

does anyone else here use the waste water from the RO unit?
I have a barrel I run mine into and use it in the washing machine....works good....mind you, our unit is in the laundry romm.

[fkshiu]

To my knowledge, the KatiAni units are simply deionizations resins. Sort of like bigger more advanced versions of the humble AP Tapwater Filter that I used to run on for my old 46 gallon.

The amount of water you'll get out of such units varies depending on the hardness of the tap water. In Vancouver, they'll last you far longer than in Calgary, for example. The resins aren't cheap at all. You can re-charge the resins, but that involves using some pretty nasty chemicals such as muriatic acid.

While there is no waste water as with an RO membrane, the pure DI water can be extremely unstable and "ion hungry". It's recommended that you added a small amount of CaCl to it even if you're only using it as top-up water. It also doesn't help things if you have low pH in the tank.

Secondly, DI-only cannot deal with particulate matter or turbid water since there's no physical filtration barrier. Similarly, higher concentrations of chlorine and chloramine can actually damage the DI-resin so getting a carbon pre-filter is probably a good idea. The importance of the pre-filtration stages most explicitly demonstrated (to me, at least) when I fill up a bucket of DI water vs. RO/DI water: the RO/DI is pure blue, whereas the DI water remains a standard tapwater blah.

From a different perspective, you don't have to "waste" RO waste water. As mentioned, you can use it to wash clothes, water your garden or wash your car.