If you are like a lot of residential pool owners, keeping high quality water is your biggest headache.  It’s important for both pleasure and safety. Plus, you can never relax about it because your water balance can get out of whack so quickly, and then restoring it is complicated and time-consuming.

The Ozone Prescription

Here’s the simple ozone-based water quality program we have seen to be successful in hundreds of pools.  This program does simplify pool maintenance because it requires fewer chemicals, beginning with less chlorine.  The ozone sanitation is virtually automatic once the system is properly installed.

1. Find the right-sized ozone generator for your pool and either make sure it is installed properly yourself or get your pool pro to do it for you.  For an above ground pool, the DEL Big Dipper is appropriate for pools up to 25,000 gallons.  For in ground pools, visit our online in ground ozone pool sizing chart to select the right size for your pool.
2. Begin with clean water.  This is obvious, we know, but you need to consider both the source water quality and how long your pool has been operating.  If you need to shock the pool to get back to a good starting point, do it.
3. Run your pool pump at least 8 hours per day (the ozone generator is linked to the pump cycle, and ozone will be introduced only when the pump is running). Running more hours per day means more ozone is injected.
4. Keep .5 to 1.0 PPM free available chlorine (FAC) in the pool at all times.
5. Keep your pH in the range of 7.2 – 7.8 (target 7.5).
6. Test your FAC and pH at least weekly, and more often if experience tells you the balance shifts quickly.

You may be surprised to see that DEL Ozone recommends using chlorine!  The fact is that ozone is so effective that whatever you add to the water is quickly used up in destroying contaminants, and after a short while all you have left is ordinary oxygen (O2).  You need to keep a residual sanitizer in the water to prevent algae and to provide a backstop when new contaminants are put into the water.  The good news is that you will use 50% to 90% less chlorine than a comparable chlorine-only pool.

How About Zero Chlorine?

We see the ads for ‘No Chlorine’ pool sanitation, too.  Ion systems in particular claim to provide no chlorine options, but ions are not effective against organic pollutants like urine and lotions, which will exist in almost every pool.  Ozone is perfectly compatible with ionizers, and provides the oxidation power you need to completely clean the water, so you might run a system with ozone + ions rather than ozone + chlorine.  However, a low level of chlorine is simpler to maintain, and easier to manage.

Bottom line:  Why Choose Ozone?

You can see a more complete comparison of ozone to other sanitizers on our alternative sanitizer page online.  However, the most important comparison is always with chlorine since it is so widely used.  Ozone will give you sweeter water and easier maintenance, but the most important thing is safety.  Ozone kills microorganisms fast and effectively.  Take a look at this chart from the Centers for Disease Control showing how chlorine kills common pool pathogens.

Slow Chlorine Disinfection Cannot Provide Safety

Chlorine takes a LONG time to kill these pathogens.  Ozone is almost instantaneous.

So, make sure you have ozone for the heavy lifting.  And keep a little chlorine in the water to complete the spectrum of security you want.

Happy swimming!