By 1916 the German sanitarians appeared to have realised that their
bacteriological standards were too stringent (Langer[21]) and that the
process had proved its value in an indisputable manner.
European practice, in the comparatively few instances in which it has
been used, has been to employ large doses of chlorine and to remove the
excess by chemicals or by filtration through special media. In 1916,
however, London commenced to chlorinate a portion of its supply and the
following year practically the whole supply was chlorinated. A dosage of
approximately 0.5 p.p.m. is used and the bleach solution is added to
the pre-filtered water. Worcester is also proposing to chlorinate the
supply to maintain the purity of the water without extending the slow
sand filtration plant.
In North America, hypochlorite of soda and chlorine were used on the
Jewell Filter at the Louisville Experimental Station in about 1896 by
George W. Fuller and a year later they were used at Adrian by Jewell.
The first commercial successful attempt was made by G. A. Johnson. In
1908 the Union Stock Yards Company of Chicago were proceeded against by
the City of Chicago regarding the condition of the effluent of the
Bubbly Creek filter plant. Copper sulphate had been previously used in
conjunction with the filters but stock shippers complained that the
water had a deleterious effect upon the animals consuming it. Johnson
eliminated the copper treatment and substituted bleach which was added
seven and a half hours previous to filtration, with a dosage of 1.5
p.p.m. The results were very satisfactory.
About the same time, Johnson and Leal commenced the treatment of the
Boonton supply of Jersey City, N. J., consumed about 40 million gallons
per day. The water was first treated with 36 pounds of bleach per
million gallons (1.4 p.p.m. of available chlorine) but this quantity was
gradually reduced until only 5 pounds per million gallons (0.2 p.p.m. of
chlorine) were being used in April, 1909. The ability of the process to
adequately purify water became the cause of a lawsuit and the decision
of the Court was:
"From the proofs taken before me, of the constant observation of the
effect of this device, I am of the opinion and find that it is an
effective process which destroys in the water the germs, the presence of
which is deemed to indicate danger, including the pathogenic germs, so
that the water after this treatment attains a purity much beyond that
attained in water supplies of other municipalities. The reduction and
practical elimination of such germs from the water was shown to be
substantially continuous.
"Upon the proofs before me, I find that the solution described leaves no
deleterious substances in the water. It does produce a slight increase
in the hardness but the increase is so slight as in my judgment to be
negligible.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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