Pool salt water chlorinator vs chlorine

While chlorine is not the only way to keep your pool clean and maintained, it is, by far, the best. There’s no avoiding that fact. However, you have a choice as to how that chlorine is delivered, and that can make a difference to concentrations of irritants in your pool, among other factors.

Traditional chlorine pools are cleaned with chlorine pool chemicals. When mixed with water, chlorine pool cleaners break down chemically into hypochlorous acid and hypochlorite ions – the chemicals that kill the bacteria in your water and keep it from turning green.

A salt water chlorinator can produce the exactly the same sanitizing pool chemicals, but through a mechanical delivery system that uses ordinary salt as a base for producing these chemicals through the process of electrolysis.

However, while the pool will need the same amount of hypochlorous acid and hypochlorite ions, irrespective of how those chemicals get in the water, it won’t require the same amount of actual chlorine. This will translate into reduced pool chemical costs, as salt costs far less than chlorine powder or tablets.

Another difference is the number of chloramines produced. Chloramines are one of the chemical byproducts created when chlorine breaks down into the active chemical sanitizers, and chloramines are what sting your eyes. Lower concentration of chloramines in the water means no more eye irritation and crying children.

A related advantage is that the water is in fact made ‘softer’ by the salt chlorinator’s chlorine generating process, as electrolysis dissolves minerals in the water. This means less irritating for skin and hair as well as eyes.

Perhaps the biggest plus though, is the constant and consistent delivery of the chlorine-based water sanitizers, which means your pool will stay blue and clear even when you are away on holiday or holding that fabulous pool party – provide you maintain your salt chlorinator throughout the year.