Water Softening

Many individuals and facilities are taking action to reduce their salt use through water softener tuneups and upgrades. Check out the case studies below to learn what actions others have taken and their results. If you are a facility manager, the Madison Metropolitan Sewerage District offers Salt Reduction Rebates for Commercial/Industrial Facilities that could help you reduce your salt use.

JK Rock Homes own and operate >800 area apartment units. For most of those, they have removed the water softeners. They found that doing so had a strong business case, even factoring in the shortened life span of hot water heaters, and that on the whole residents did not mind. Removing softeners full stop isn’t for everyone, but JK Rock Homes made it work – hear their story, including their tips & tricks- #hardwaterhacks- below!  

As a Salt Wise partner, Dane County wanted to protect fresh water by reducing salt. With funding from Dane County sustainability grants and Madison Municipal Sewerage District rebates, they were able to improve water softening systems at four of their facilities. In their public safety building, preliminary results have shown a 56% salt reduction resulting in a cost savings of over $2,600 per year.
To learn more about this project, contact Todd Draper.

Hydrite Chemical Co. received a rebate from Madison Metropolitan Sewerage District to implement brine reclamation systems on two softeners at their Cottage Grove facility and saved about 39,000 pounds of salt per year. The company was so pleased with the result that they went on to implement brine reclamation in Oshkosh; Terre Haute, Ind.; Waterloo, Iowa; and Lubbock, Texas, with payback periods of less than three years without rebates.

Hydrite also reduced its use of softened water. In Cottage Grove, a system that used soft water to cool a boiler pump was replaced with a system that uses air to cool the pump. The move cut Hydrite’s soft water use by about 900,000 gallons per year, which also reduced the company’s water bill.

After a multi-million dollar renovation of its rooms, the Best Western PLUS InnTowner hotel in Madison upgraded its mechanical systems. The resin in the old water softener had deteriorated with age and the unit was inefficient and leaking. Spurred by a rebate from the Madison Metropolitan Sewerage district, the hotel installed new, efficient softeners with brine reclamation. Since installation, they have saved at least 557 pounds of salt per month.

UnityPoint Health-Meriter Hospital in Madison has implemented several projects to reduce salt use including different methods to condition water for heating and cooling systems. First, Meriter installed several “Green Machines” that use electricity rather than salt to condition makeup water for cooling towers. Meriter also has replaced switched from a water softener to chemical treatment prior to the reverse osmosis system. With these changes, the hospital has achieved a total salt reduction of 4,261 pounds per month.