How Is Water Treated for Human Use?

Public water systems often use a series of water treatment steps that include coagulation, flocculation, sedimentation, filtration, and disinfection.

How Is Water Treated for Human Use?

Water treatment is a process of improving the quality of water for human use. It typically involves removing contaminants, such as bacteria, viruses, chemicals, and other impurities, and making the water safe and suitable for drinking, bathing, and other applications.

Water treatment is an important part of public health and environmental protection, as it helps to ensure that water sources are not contaminated or polluted.

The first step in water treatment is the removal of particulate matter, such as dirt and sediment. This is usually done with a sedimentation process.

The water is allowed to settle and the heavier particles settle to the bottom. The water is then passed through a filtration process to remove smaller particles and impurities.

The most common type of filtration is the use of sand filters. Sand filters use layers of sand to remove particles, as well as some organic matter. The next step in water treatment is to remove bacteria and viruses.

This is done through disinfection. Disinfection is the process of killing or inactivating microbes in water. Chlorination is the most common method used for disinfection.

It involves adding chlorine to the water, which kills or inactivates most bacteria and viruses. Chlorination does not however, remove any