WaterTreatmentChemicals.net is an independent reference on water treatment chemicals that covers 16 chemical families and 7 application programs and states each value with its source and its date. Who publishes it, where do its numbers come from, and why does it sell nothing?
The 16 families themselves are compared on the overview of water treatment chemicals.
This page covers what the reference is and whom it serves, its scope, its 10 primary sources and dating rules, its independence, its authorship and its corrections route.
Values on this site are checked against primary sources (NSF listings, AWWA, CEN, EPA, eCFR, Federal Register, EUR-Lex, ECHA, WHO, PubChem); see our methodology and fact-checking process.
What Is WaterTreatmentChemicals.net?#
WaterTreatmentChemicals.net is an independent, vendor-neutral technical reference on the chemicals and media that operators, engineers and utilities dose or specify to treat water in industrial, municipal and utility systems. Each chemical page states its function, dosing point, dose and basis, control tests, and governing rules and standards.
The reference sells no chemical and no service, and it is not a regulator: NSF issues NSF/ANSI/CAN 60 listings, and EPA and the States set the drinking-water limits of 40 CFR 141.
Who is the water treatment chemicals reference written for?#
The water treatment chemicals reference is written for 4 reader groups at industrial and municipal sites, listed below.
- Plant operators who dose and control chemical programs
- Water-treatment engineers who design and specify programs
- EHS and compliance staff who report against permits and drinking-water rules
- Procurement staff who buy chemicals and treatment services
What Does the Water Treatment Chemicals Reference Cover?#
The water treatment chemicals reference covers 16 chemical families, 7 application programs, the chemistry and standards behind them, plus calculators and sourcing pages, as Table 1 shows. The 16 families keep one fixed order on every page, from coagulants to filter media.
Table 1 compares the sections by what each one answers.
| Section | What it answers | Example question |
|---|---|---|
| Every chemical with function, CAS and NSF/ANSI 60 status | each chemical with its function, CAS number and NSF/ANSI/CAN 60 status | Which CAS number and systems does ferric chloride have? |
| Industrial water treatment | 7 application programs: cooling towers, boilers, membranes, wastewater, drinking water, closed loops, produced water | Which program controls scale in an open cooling tower? |
| Water treatment chemistry concepts | scaling, corrosion, disinfection and coagulation concepts | How is the Langelier index calculated? |
| Water treatment regulations and standards | EPA, NSF, AWWA and EU rules | Which chemicals need NSF/ANSI/CAN 60 certification? |
| Water treatment calculators and quote tools | dosage, LSI and other calculators; the 2 quote forms | How many lb/day of a chemical does a dose need? |
| Water treatment companies | how to choose and compare a program provider | What does a full-service program include? |
| Water treatment chemical suppliers | supplier types: manufacturers, blenders, distributors | Who makes and distributes a chemical? |
| Water treatment process | every treatment stage and the chemicals it uses | Which chemicals does each stage use? |
| Water quality parameters | alkalinity, hardness, turbidity and other parameters | What is P and M alkalinity? |
| Chemical feed and water treatment equipment | how equipment shapes the chemical program | Which pump materials suit hypochlorite? |
| Water treatment chemicals news | regulation, supply and technology changes | What changed in a rule this month? |
The chemical scope is benchmarked against 3 public catalogs: the 47 US EPA Water Treatment Chemical Supply Chain Profiles (36 for chemicals used in water treatment, updated 2026-06-30), the 49 AWWA B-series standards from B100-25 to B703-24, and the NSF/ANSI/CAN 60 listings of 1,150 companies (NSF listings, 2026-10-21).
Where does the reference's scope end?#
The reference ends at the edge of industrial, municipal and utility systems, and it describes each multi-use chemical for its water use only. The 4 exclusions are listed below.
- No pool, spa, hot-tub, pond or aquarium chemistry
- No household, point-of-use or emergency water treatment
- No medical, food, cosmetic or agricultural uses of the same chemicals
- No general or laboratory chemistry beyond what a water page needs
Which Primary Sources Does the Reference Use?#
The reference takes its values from 10 primary sources: NSF listings, AWWA standards, CEN standards, US EPA documents, the eCFR, the Federal Register, EUR-Lex, ECHA, the WHO drinking-water guidelines and PubChem, each named in the sentence that uses it. These standards bodies, regulators and official registers each supply one kind of value, as Table 2 shows.
| Source | Issuer | What it supplies | How the site cites it (example) |
|---|---|---|---|
| NSF/ANSI/CAN 60 product listings | NSF | product-specific maximum use levels, as product, and listing conditions | "NSF listings, 2026-10-21"; aluminum coagulant listings carry the condition "aluminum in finished water not to exceed 2 mg/L" |
| AWWA B-series standards | American Water Works Association | product standards for treatment chemicals and media | full edition, such as ANSI/AWWA B403-24 (aluminum sulfate) |
| EN standards for drinking water treatment chemicals (CEN/TC 164) | European Committee for Standardization | European product standards for drinking-water chemicals | full edition, such as EN 878:2016 (aluminium sulfate, EN title spelling kept) |
| US EPA documents | US Environmental Protection Agency | guidance, supply-chain profiles, rule status | title and date, such as Water Treatment Chemical Supply Chain Profiles, updated 2026-06-30 |
| eCFR | Office of the Federal Register | current federal regulations | part and section, such as 40 CFR 141.65: MRDL 4.0 mg/L as Cl2 for chlorine, running annual average |
| Federal Register | Office of the Federal Register | publication and effective dates of rules and proposals | volume, page and date, such as 89 FR 86418 (2024-10-30) |
| EUR-Lex: EU Drinking Water Directive 2020/2184 | Publications Office of the EU | EU directives and regulations | instrument and article, such as Directive (EU) 2020/2184, Article 12 for treatment chemicals |
| ECHA | European Chemicals Agency | EU hazard classifications | label "harmonised (CLP Annex VI)" or "notified (ECHA C&L)" |
| WHO Guidelines for Drinking-water Quality | World Health Organization | international guideline values | edition and date: fourth edition incorporating the first, second and third addenda (17 June 2026) |
| PubChem | US National Library of Medicine (NIH) | chemical identity: CAS numbers, formulas, names | identifier, such as aluminum sulfate CAS 10043-01-3 |
National guidelines, such as Health Canada's technical documents and the NHMRC's Australian Drinking Water Guidelines, add dose ranges and treatment practice. Peer-reviewed papers, handbooks and manufacturer data appear only where no primary source gives a value, and the sentence then names them.
How are values sourced, dated and stated in units?#
Every regulatory value carries its instrument, section and date, every standard its full edition and every certification value its listing date, such as "NSF listings, 2026-10-21". Every dose states its basis, in metric units first with US units in parallel, as Table 3 shows.
| Value type | Convention on every page | Example |
|---|---|---|
| US federal regulation | instrument, section and date; pending and final kept apart | 40 CFR 141.80(c) as amended by LCRI (89 FR 86418, 2024-10-30): lead action level 0.010 mg/L (90th percentile) from 2027-11-01, 0.015 mg/L until then |
| Proposed rule | "proposed" with its publication date; never written as final | EPA PFAS proposals of 2026-05-18: pending |
| Standard | full edition | ANSI/AWWA B403-24; EN 878:2016 |
| Certification listing | listing date; product-specific value, as product | "NSF listings, 2026-10-21" |
| International guideline | edition and date | WHO GDWQ, fourth edition incorporating the first, second and third addenda, 17 June 2026 |
| Concentration | metric first, US in parallel; basis named | mg/L (ppm), as CaCO3, as Cl2, as PO4, as product |
| Temperature, pressure, flow, feed | metric first, US in parallel | °C (°F); bar (psig); m³/h (gpm); kg/d (lb/day); µS/cm |
| Hardness unit | conversion stated once | 1 gpg = 17.1 mg/L as CaCO3 |
| ppm vs mg/L | equal only at a density of about 1 | dense solutions are stated in mg/L or wt % |
| Hypochlorite strength | trade % is not wt % | 12.5 trade % = 125 g/L available chlorine = about 11.2 wt % NaOCl |
| Handbook or manufacturer figure | labelled in the sentence | "a manufacturer figure", "a handbook figure", with the document named |
Conventions used site-wide; conversions such as gpg to mg/L as CaCO3 sit in the water treatment unit converter.
Proposed rules are never written as final: EPA's PFAS proposals of 2026-05-18 are pending.
The PFAS limits published on 2024-04-26 (89 FR 32532) remain the codified values, as the eCFR showed on 2026-10-01.
Each value leads back to a source and a check date, as set out in how every value is sourced and verified.
How Does WaterTreatmentChemicals.net Stay Independent?#
WaterTreatmentChemicals.net stays independent because it sells no chemical and no service, and no partner pays for placement in editorial content: values, tables and comparisons are the same whoever asks. We fund the reference through quote requests, which the program and chemical quote forms pass to independent providers and suppliers; any display advertising sits below main content and never on trust pages. No lead partner has been chosen, and none is presented as recommended, verified or preferred.
Entity pages list makers alphabetically in one neutral table; other pages name a company only as the source of a figure, and any later paid listing is marked as sponsored.
The full rules on independence, lead partners and corrections are in the editorial policy on independence and lead partners.
Who Writes WaterTreatmentChemicals.net?#
WaterTreatmentChemicals.net is written and maintained by the WaterTreatmentChemicals.net Editorial Team, which compiles each page from the primary sources in Table 2 and publishes under one organization byline. A value that cannot be confirmed from a named source is left out of the page rather than estimated. Every page carries that byline with a link to the fact-checking method.
How Can Readers Contact the Editors or Report an Error?#
Readers contact the editors or report an error through the contact form, and a corrected value then appears on the page with its new check date.
Questions about a value, a page or a quote request go through contact WaterTreatmentChemicals.net. How corrections are decided and shown is part of the editorial policy.
Why do most pages name no company?#
Most pages name no company because the reference is vendor-neutral: hubs and application pages compare chemicals and programs, and only entity pages list makers, alphabetically and without ranking.
Does the reference replace a product label, SDS or regulation?#
No: for a specific product, the label, the safety data sheet and the NSF listing govern, and for a legal limit the regulation itself governs; the reference cites them and gives no medical advice.
What does a dose basis such as "as product" mean on this site?#
"As product" means the dose counts the commercial product as delivered, not its active ingredient; other bases, such as as CaCO3, as Cl2 or as PO4, name the compound or ion the number refers to. An NSF/ANSI/CAN 60 maximum use level, for example, is always stated as product.