Our Black Berkey® Purification elements are a proprietary blend of several different media types including high grade coconut shell carbon.
The Black Berkey® Purification Elements are the leader of gravity-fed water purifiers. Each element is designed to purify approximately 3,000 gallons of water before needing to be replaced; 2 elements in a Berkey® system will purify approximately 6,000 gallons of water before replacement is recommended. The Black Berkey® Purification Elements are sold as a set of two and can be used to upgrade most gravity-fed water filter systems, they are re-cleanable and self sterilizing.
Yes, the base of Black Berkey Purification Element is BPA free.
If you have used your elements:
The method of storage depends upon the length of time that the Black Berkey® Purification Elements will not be used:
If the filters will not be used between 4 to 15 days and you want to avoid the re-priming process, remove the filters from the system, place them into a sealable sandwich bag or container and place the filters in the refrigerator towards the front to ensure that they do not freeze. This will allow the filters to stay mostly saturated so that re-priming is not typically necessary. If for any reason the filters run slower than ususal, re-prime them until the exterior wall of the filter begins to sweat beads of water for 10 seconds.
For long term storage, we recommend drying and sealing the filters. The key is to ensure they are bone-dry before storing them long-term, to prevent any potential bacterial growth. One option for drying your filters is to leave them on a window sill for one to three days and allow them to air-dry. We also offer a tool to assist in both priming and purging. This tool is called a Black Berkey Primer™. The benefit to purging the Black Berkey® Purification Elements is that they are dried very quickly. Once the filters are bone-dry, place them in a storage bag such as a large, seal-able sandwich bag. The elements are extremely powerful and can absorb odors and smoke from the air. By sealing them in a storage bag, they should not absorb any odors from the air. When you are ready to re-use your filters, clean them by scrubbing the outside with a Scotch-Brite® pad or stiff brush. Then re-prime the filters either manually or with the Black Berkey Primer™ before putting them back in the system.
In theory, the shelf life of the Black Berkey® Purification Elements is indefinite.
**Please note that the storage methods above apply to the Black Berkey® Purification Elements only.
If you have never used your elements:
If the elements are unopened and in their original packaging, please ensure you do not store the elements in an area that also has strong smells to them, such as a laundry room or garage. The elements have carbon as one of their components so it is possible for them to absorb the odors of the room they are stored in. For example if they are stored in a laundry room, it is possible for the media in the elements to pick up the odor of highly fragranced items such as powdered laundry soap.
** When storing the chambers of your Berkey® system, it is best to empty both chambers before storing them, because anytime water is still, it becomes stagnant and can produce bacteria. We recommend washing your Berkey® system with soapy water before leaving it to dry.
When water is filtered through our system, the Black Berkey® Purification Elements increase the PH level of the water. This is healthful because pathogenic bacteria and viruses thrive in acidic environments and have difficulty surviving in alkaline environments. An environment with more alkalinity does have a higher PH level. The PH level will depend on various factors including what the PH level of the pre-filtered water is.
Yes, silver is used as an antimicrobial to self-sterilize the Black Berkey® elements. Testing was conducted both internally and by Analytical Services, Inc. to insure that the silver used does not leach into the purified water.
“All controls samples, including stock samples, analytical positive and negative controls, and the negative control collected prior to seeding yielded appropriate results and were accepted. The results of the leaching control samples (effluent sample spiked with MS2 and R. terrigena and analyzed at two time points) were quite similar, suggesting that no active antimicrobial agent is leaching into the treated water.”
The ASI test report results can be seen here
Black Berkey® purification elements have been successfully tested for reduction of several EDC’s; including Progesterone, Octylphenol, Nonylphenol, THMs and BPA. And, while estrogen and EE2 have not been specifically tested, the assumption is that these contaminants will also be removed from water, based on the reduction testing conducted on similar EDC’s. While existing testing strongly indicates that the Black Berkey® purification elements will reduce estrogen, based on currently available information, BERKEY does not have specific test data to that end. As such, we do not make a claim that the elements will reduce estrogen, only that indications are strong that Black Berkey® purification elements should do so.
BERKEY ALWAYS recommends that you use the cleanest source of water available; however we understand that during emergencies a clean source of water may not be available.
Many filter elements can show strong results that quickly decline. As such, we think it to be vitally important, with certain contaminants, that the reduction capability of our Black Berkey® elements be tested over time. Such tests provide the rate of decline in efficiency and allow our customers a verification that the rate of decline is not significant. As an example of a significant rate of decline, we are aware of other filter elements that claim fluoride reduction at 100%. Yet, in a time test and after only 40 gallons, the reduction rate falls to a mere 82.4%; this is nearly an 18% drop in performance after just 40 gallons. While an initial drop in efficiency is always expected, the 50 gallon test serves to verify that such drastic reduction does not take place with our Black Berkey® elements. For example, in our Gross Alpha reduction test, the efficiency reduces from 99.2% to 98.7% after 50 gallons. This represents a reduction in efficiency of only 0.5% (1/2 of 1%) after 50 gallons, which likely indicates that at the end of the 3,000 gallon life of the element, the reduction level should still be around 70%.
By the way, BERKEY could have conducted the radiological contaminant reduction testing on the first gallon only, which would have been significantly less, in terms of cost. However, because of the serious nature of these particular contaminants, this would not provide our customers with a realistic understanding of how their elements would perform during a short term nuclear crisis situation. As such, the testing of the Black Berkey® purification elements was conducted to 50 gallons; an extreme situation and test. To our knowledge, this is the most gallons tested of any other purification element, which gives our customers a far better understanding of the element’s actual capabilities for removing radiological contamination from water in a highly contaminated hot zone.
Moreover, it is important to understand that radiological contamination is quite different from most other contaminants in that such contamination is typically not present in drinking water that is utilized over long periods of time. In most cases radiological contamination occurs after some sort of nuclear accident or event. In such cases the primary objective for those in the contaminated hot zone is to clear the area and to get to a non-contaminated zone as quickly as possible. It is highly unlikely that anyone would purposely remain in a hot zone for a long duration of time. Rather, during such events, the removal of radiological contaminants is typically needed for a short period of time during the evacuation process.
Additionally, it is important to keep in mind that most Berkey® systems come with at least two elements. Therefore, the reduction efficiency is effectively doubled with two elements. In systems with four elements, the reduction efficiency is quadrupled, six elements would mean six times the efficiency, etc.
For those who are unfortunate enough to be caught in a radiological contamination zone, it is recommended that the Black Berkey® purification elements be replaced as soon as is reasonably possible. This is because the more radiological contaminants the elements remove, the more radioactive the elements themselves become.