When the water level in our pool drops, we immediately wonder if the pool is losing water or if the drop in level is due to evaporation.
If you have this concern, below we explain how to find out with complete guarantee if your pool has water leaks or not.
First of all, we recommend that you do not make this enquiry on the Internet. Information on the web is very contradictory. In some articles we are told that “pools can lose between 2 and 13cm per week through natural evaporation…”!!! This is uncertain and could lead us to think that losing 13cm is normal and that there is no problem. Evaporation depends on many environmental factors and pool usage, so these statements should not be taken as true.
On the other hand, to calculate with total accuracy how much water evaporates in a swimming pool, there are formulas such as those of Bernier or Carreras that help us calculate this figure. Let’s see how Bernier’s formula works using a concrete example. The formula for the calculation is as follows Me = (S *16 + 133*n) * (We – (Ga*Was)) + 0.1*N
where:
Me = mass of water evaporated [kg/h]
S= swimming pool surface (m2)
We=absolute humidity of saturated air at water temperature (kg water/kg air)
Was=absolute humidity of saturated air at indoor air temperature (kg water/kg air)
Ga=degree of saturation (%)
n= number of swimmers
N= total number of spectators
Suppose we have a swimming pool with 312.5 m2 of water surface (S); with 20 swimmers (n); with 50 spectators (N); with a saturation degree of 65% (Ga), and with an air temperature of 25ºC and a water temperature of 27ºC. With this data and the following table:
Absolute humidity of saturated air
we can find out the missing data for We and Was:
We= 0.02 is the absolute humidity of saturated air at the air temperature of 25°C
Was=0.0225 is the absolute humidity of saturated air at the water temperature of 27ºC
With all this data collected, we will perform the following calculation:
Me = (S *16 + 133*n) * (We – (Ga*Was)) + 0.1*N =
= (312.5*16 +133*20) * (0.02-(0.65*0.0225)) +0.1*50 = 46.17 kg/h of evaporated water
Knowing that a week has 168 hours, the total kgs of water evaporated will be 7.756kgs/week, equivalent to 7.76 m3 of water, which in turn divided by the m2 of water sheet, tells us with total accuracy that our pool will lose:
7.76 m3 / 312.5 m2 = 2.48 cm of water level each week
The formula is very accurate, but the use of this formula is not straightforward.
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Fixcer offers you a quick, simple and very intuitive method to be able to be sure whether or not our pool is leaking water: “the bucket method”
The basic principle is very simple to understand: “Water in a swimming pool evaporates at the same speed as water in a bucket.” The sequence is as follows: fill a bucket with water and mark its initial level; place the bucket on a step in the pool; also mark the initial water level in the pool. After a reasonable amount of time, compare the difference in levels.
1st possibility: the pool does not lose water when the level drops are identical
Initial situation:
Final situation:
2nd possibility: the pool loses water when the level drops are different
Initial situation:
Final situation:
If your pool is leaking water, please contact us. We will advise you on how to repair water leaks effectively and quickly.
