Magnetic water treatment – how might it work?

Abstract

Claims that passing hard water through a magnetic field somehow influences the structure and morphology of the calcium carbonate that forms when the water is subsequently heated have been met with robust scepticism. This was largely due to the absence of any plausible mechanism whereby water could acquire a long-lasting magnetically-imprinted memory. Recent work challenging classical nucleation theory, insofar as calcium carbonate is concerned, has advanced the idea of liquid-like prenucleation clusters of indeterminate shape that are thermodynamically-stable in calcium carbonate solutions. These nanometer-scale clusters may be the key to the problem; the possible influence on them of a magnetic field via Maxwell-like stress or singlet–triplet mixing of proton dimers leading to a long-lived change in the number of ionic bonds is discussed.

Keywords:

• magnetic water treatment
• calcium carbonate
• nucleation
• magnetic properties
• crystal growth

Acknowledgements

This work was supported by Science Foundation Ireland as part of the NISE project (Contract 10/IN1/I3002). The author is grateful to Spomenka Kobe, Maria Balanda, Kristin Poduska, Tiju Thomas, Plamen Stamenov and Lorena Monzon for helpful discussions.