The best way to remove manganese from drinking water is with a home water treatment system.
Air-injection oxidation filtration
For well water that contains iron, manganese, and hydrogen sulfide (three minerals that often occur together), air-injection oxidation filtration is the best solution.
Air-injection oxidation filters use a water tank with air bubbles on top. As the water flows through the bubbles, minerals (including manganese) are oxidized. These minerals are then trapped in a bed of manganese green or manganese ore.
When the system is backwashed, the minerals are removed from the media. Air-injection oxidation can remove up to 5 ppm of manganese from water.
Cation exchange
A cation exchange water softener can remove small amounts of manganese from water.
Cation exchange softens water by exchanging cations (particularly calcium and magnesium). The primary purpose of cation exchange is to prevent damage caused by hardness minerals, but the process can also be used to remove low levels of other minerals such as iron and manganese. If your water contains high concentrations of manganese, then cation exchange is not the best solution.
Distillation
Distillation is a good way to remove manganese from drinking water.
During distillation, water is heated until it boils and evaporates. Minerals like manganese have different boiling points than water, so they remain in the boiling chamber as the water passes through cooling channels and condenses into a separate container.
Distillation can remove almost all impurities from water. However, the downside to this method is that the distillation process is very slow and can only be used for point-of-use applications, so it will not solve manganese problems throughout the home.
