Review of Lime-Soda Water Softening

Mr. George W. Fuller read the first paper ever presented to this association on water softening for municipal supplies, at the 26th annual convention held in Boston in July 1906. At that time there were only two municipal water softening plants in North America. One was at Winnipeg, Canada, placed in operation in 1901, and the other at Oberlin, Ohio, which started operating in 1903. Mr. C. Arthur Brown (present at this meeting) designed the Oberlin plant which was not only the first municipal water softening plant in the United States, but was the first plant in this country or abroad using both lime and soda ash for a municipal supply. The water at Winnipeg was taken from wells and had a total hardness of about 486 parts per million. The permanent hardness was 148 parts per million, but was not removed. Lime softening reduced the temporary hardness to 80 parts per million leaving a hardness in the finished water of 228 parts per million, far too hard to be regarded as satisfactory. Oberlin carried the softening treatment somewhat further, in that the hardness was reduced from about 300 parts per million to about 80 parts per million. The earliest municipal plants of which there seem to be a record were placed in operation at Canterbury and Southampton, England. The Southampton plant was placed in operation in 1888 and the one at Canterbury at a slightly earlier date. The designers of the early municipal softening plants built in this country following the construction of the Oberlin plant, deserve especial recognition and praise for the splendid plants they built. They were pioneers and had few or no precedents to follow. It was necessary for them to design every piece of important equipment needed and many of the appurtenances incorporated into the plants. Design efforts now, as compared to then, are rather simple. There is now a wide choice of