Amiad Water Systems, a global producer of water treatment and filtration solutions, announce in March that its AMF microfiber filter technology has been evaluated and certified by NSF International, an independent public health and safety accreditation organization, for Cryptosporidium removal according to NSF/ANSI 419: Public Drinking Water Equipment Performance for municipal water filtration technologies. This is Amiad’s second NSF accreditation following its receipt of certification for safety of drinking water system components (NSF/ANSI 61) in 2014.
This new standard, NSF/ANSI 419, is the first consensus-based American National Standard to evaluate the performance of municipal water filtration technologies in removing Cryptosporidium from public drinking water supplies. It incorporates state and federal regulatory requirements thereby assisting state regulators in verifying compliance while reducing time and costs for manufacturers by streamlining the testing process.
Municipal water treatment plants that use surface waters such as lakes, rivers and streams as a source of public drinking water are required to filter out microorganisms and bacteria such as Cryptosporidium (unless exempted by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)). To ensure Cryptosporidium is effectively removed from public drinking water, the EPA created the Long Term 2 Enhanced Surface Water Treatment Rule (LT2), which applies to all public water systems that use surface water or ground water that is under the direct influence of surface water.
The NSF/ANSI 419 standard incorporates the EPA LT2 Rule as well as other federal and state requirements, and is an accompaniment to NSF/ANSI 61: Drinking Water System Components – Health Effects, which sets contaminant limits for components that come into contact with drinking water such as plumbing components and pipes. The NSF certification program also requires annual auditing of the manufacturing facility, which provides further reassurance.
The complete Amiad AMF microfiber filter series has received the certification using 2 micron cassettes. The Log Removal Value (LRV) of the challenge tests was a mean of 2.76 log10.
Peachie Maher Hytowitz, Technical Marketing Manager of Amiad Water Systems (USA), said: “The AMF microfiber filter series is an ideal solution for small- to medium-sized plants and rural municipalities that require additional treatment for their systems due to LT2 rules and would like the benefit of an automatically operated and self-cleaning filter technology for small flow rates without the complications and expense of installing membranes or media filters. The AMF microfiber filter series will also reduce turbidity and SDI and improve UV transmissivity. We are pleased to have received this further accreditation, which is testament to the importance we place on safety and the environment.”
