What does NSF certification of home water treatment systems cover?

NSF certification of home water treatment covers four major areas.

1) Systems (and some components such as housings) that are intended for installation on a pressurized water line are checked for structural integrity to ensure they do not leak or crack.

2) Both complete systems and components can also go through extraction testing, which is a process that involves exposing the wetted parts (the parts that are intended for contact with the water, such as the inside of the housing, the filter media, etc.) to an aggressive test water to determine if any heavy metals or other impurities are being introduced. The standards limit the amount of impurities that a certified system can introduce, with the maximum allowed concentrations being based on US EPA or Health Canada drinking water limits.

3) Testing is available on assembled systems to verify if the product being tested is truly effective at reducing the contaminants being claimed by the manufacturer. A list of the contaminant testing protocols that are used to validate performance can be found in the consumer pages of our website at www.nsf.org/consumer/drinking_water.

4) Lastly, NSF will also verify the accuracy of the labeling on the packaging of NSF Certified systems to ensure it does not contain any false or misleading statements. While performance testing is done on a pass/fail basis, if a company chooses to put percentages on the product packaging, we will ensure they do match the official test results that specific product achieved.