Residents of Romsey face hard water – and this is why…

If you don’t like hard water, Romsey’s not a great place to be – unless you have a water softener of course! As with everywhere else in Hampshire and much of the south-east of England, it’s the same story. Blame it all on the soil!

Romsey sits on soil largely comprising of chalk and limestone, which contains an abundance of calcium and magnesium minerals. Rainwater is naturally soft but when it reaches the soil, those calcium and magnesium components get to work and make the mains water supply hard.

The benefits of having a water softener are instant and plentiful! For a start, your skin and hair will respond well to soft water. It prevents them from becoming dry. Instead, you’ll experience silky smooth skin and vibrant, lustrous hair. Laundry too, loves softened water. Clothing and towels have that awful starchy feel when they come out of a hard water wash.

And then we come to that dreaded word – limescale. All caused by hard water. Water softeners are superb at eradicating scale build-up and will stop it clogging up pipework and household appliances, like washing machines and dishwashers. Soft water also makes it much easier to keep kitchens and bathrooms looking and staying clean for longer. And you won’t use nearly as many detergents or get through shampoos and gels so rapidly.

Central heating systems also work more efficiently and have a far longer lifespan with soft water running through the pipes. Hard water forces them to work harder, costing more to generate the appropriate amount of energy. Over time, boilers seriously downgrade and they are very expensive to replace!

In Romsey, the water hardness measures around 284 parts per million (ppm). For readings above 200ppm, this is deemed to be hard, meaning Romsey registers towards the top of the water hardness scale.

Romsey – an Overview

Annual rainfall: 30.17inch or 781mm.

Romsey is an historic Hampshire market town, home to the 19th-century British prime minister, Lord Palmerston and the 20th-century naval officer and statesman Louis Mountbatten, 1st Earl Mountbatten of Burma.

Lying on the River Test, Romsey is 7 miles northwest of Southampton and 11 miles southwest of Winchester. It has a growing population of just over 19,000 people. In 2019, the town centre underwent a substantial uplift, which saw the removal of the roundabout that featured Lord Palmerston’s statue, thus creating a pedestrianised area.
In 2014, Romsey was described by The Guardian as ‘resoundingly, timelessly English’. It is popular amongst retirees.