My Water Smells Bad. Can Water Conditioning Help?

If your water smells bad, this is usually a good indication that it’s contaminated and needs water conditioning or filtration. Clean water is completely odorless, so if you notice any smells from your water, you should be concerned about the potential contamination.

We offer free water testing to determine what contaminants are in your water and how to treat them for healthier water in your home.

Water Smells Like Rotten Eggs or Sulfur

If your water smells like rotten eggs or sulfur, this is usually an indication of a certain type of bacteria in your water. This bacteria gives off hydrogen sulfide gas, which gives that rotten egg smell that you might have in your water. This bacteria can also make your water taste salty.

Issues with sulfur-producing bacteria are pretty common, whether you have city or well water. This bacteria isn’t considered harmful to most people, so it may slip by on any water quality checks from your community water system. Nevertheless, it can cause serious water quality issues and might also affect the taste. Reverse osmosis water purification systems can remove this bacteria so you can enjoy the cleanest, freshest water in your home.

Water Smells Musty, Moldy, or Fishy

Earthy smells like must, mildew, mold, or fish generally point to a few things. One is dissolved solids, which are generally minerals, salts, metals, or even soil. Another is decaying organic matter, like a dead animal or plant in the water system. These smells can also be due to an algae bloom in the water source.

Whole house water filtration systems can remove most contaminants that cause this smell from your water. For severe smells, you  may need a reverse osmosis water purification system to purify your drinking water.

Water Smells Like Chlorine, Bleach, or a Swimming Pool

If your water smells like chlorine, bleach, or a swimming pool, this is usually left over chlorine from the community water system’s disinfection process. Most community water systems chlorinate the water to kill off germs that might make you sick, but it can also make your water smell and taste kind of like a swimming pool.

Water filtration systems like carbon adsorption and reverse osmosis can remove chlorine chemicals from your water so it smells and tastes better. This way you can have peace of mind that your water is clean.

Water Smells Metallic

When your water has a metallic smell, this usually means it’s contaminated with some type of metal. Some common metallic water contaminants include:

• Mercury
• Lead
• Copper
• Arsenic
• Iron

These heavy metals can cause serious health complications in high levels, so it’s important to address this serious water quality issue immediately.

If you have water contaminated with heavy metals, we can design a system to remove them from your water. Usually this involves using special carbon filters in your whole house water filtration systems to prevent you coming into contact with these contaminants when you drink water, bathe, cook, and clean.

Water Smells like Sewer

When you smell your water and it smells like sewage, it’s usually due to sewage contamination in your drinking water. This is pretty rare but does certainly happen. For instance, it may be an issue if there’s a sewer line break or backup that is contaminating the city’s water supply.

This usually requires heavy-duty water conditioning. We may recommend a whole house filtration system to remove most of the contaminants and then using reverse osmosis purification systems at kitchen sinks and other areas where you get your drinking water, as reverse osmosis removes 99.9% of impurities.

Water Smells Like Turpentine or Other Chemicals

If your water has a distinctly chemical smell like turpentine, detergent, alcohol, or something else, then it’s likely there’s chemical contamination to your water. Some potential contaminants that may give your water a chemical smell include byproducts from gasoline production, detergents, inks, pesticides, herbicides, and fertilizers.

Once again, this smell from your water is a serious concern and requires thorough action. Our team can test the water to determine exactly what the contaminant is and recommend water filtration systems that remove the contaminant from your water so it’s healthy.