Is it normal to pee in swimming pool

Related Story. This content is created and maintained by a third party, and imported onto this page to help users provide their email addresses. You may be able to find more information about this and similar content at piano.

Advertisement - Continue Reading Below. More From Health. Created for From Prevention for Created by Prevention for. That is the question adults and children ask themselves every summer. Each summer, some swimmers and not just kids! That is, what should you do when you need to pee? And if so, is this safe? Urologist Petar Bajic, MD , weighs in on whether you should just go, or find yourself a proper restroom. Learn the scientific pros and cons to consider in favor of holding it — or not.

And just how safe is it to swim in public pools if other people have peed in them? Urea is also found in sweat, for instance. Since swimmers sweat so much during practice, sweat cannot be a discounted factor. Urine has a much higher concentration of urea than sweat does, but generally a swimming pool will have more sweat in it than urine after a swim practice.

The factor is unknown and difficult to measure, but we bring it up just to illustrate a point. As nice as it would be if swimmers would stop peeing in the pool, how can you restrict sweat? Sure, any little bit helps, so showering before swimming and not peeing in the pool give chlorine less nitrogen to oxidize.

There is a reason seemingly every scientist involved with this issue brings up urine in pools as a source of the problem. We just want to remind you about reality. One person peeing in a , gallon m 3 swimming pool will not make or break the air quality for the entire natatorium. What actually occurs is persistent contamination that eventually overwhelms chlorine, and causes it to fall behind.

When the pollution rate exceeds the oxidation rate, the problems will compound, and manifest themselves as high combined chlorine and bad indoor air quality. Another concern with persistent loading of nitrogen compounds into water is the formation of nitrates. All that urea and ammonia in water will eventually be oxidized by chlorine and converted into nitrate, all at the expense of free chlorine. Lowry, here's the chemical progression: 1. Urea's Reaction with Chlorine.

On the final line, that's trichloramine nitrogen trichloride plus free chlorine and water, which yields nitrate, four chlorides and five hydrogens.

Yikes, that's some complex chemistry. We spent the past 25 minutes typing that and double checking it to make sure we had it right. And we did that to illustrate just how complicated the oxidation process of urea actually is.

It takes five units of Hypochlorous acid HOCl, the strong form of free chlorine to break down a urea into a form that eventually creates nitrate NO 3 - , which is the final stage of nitrogen in water. In other words, nitrogen cannot be oxidized any further, so nitrates stay in water until drained out or filtered using reverse osmosis. Unfortunately, dealing with nitrogen compounds is inevitable. To quote Lowry again:.

It is inevitable that you will get ammonia or nitrogen compounds [like urea] in the water. Therefore you must deal with them as they are introduced, AND after they have combined with chlorine.

Most pools deal with chlorine-reducing organic nitrogen compounds after they are formed rather than when they are introduced" - Page Amen, Dr. It is inevitable that nitrogen compounds will get in the water. Even if swimmers are not peeing, they're still sweating. Therefore we must deal with these compounds. He summarized our position well. He also mentions most pools deal with these compounds after they are formed, meaning after they have combined with chlorine.

This is a nod to UV systems, since they cannot oxidize things like urea, but can break down formed chloramines. So peeing in the pool puts nitrogen in the water that will add to chlorine's oxidant demand, but it takes a lot of urine to make the indoor air quality of a natatorium go south.

Either way, we have to address it once it's in the pool. Urine is sterile, so there should be nothing for chlorine to "kill". Although the researchers were unable to confirm exactly what fraction of visitors were choosing to quietly relieve themselves in the water rather than making the shivery trip to the changing rooms, the results suggest that the urine content was being topped up several times each day.

The findings make for unwelcome reading, but swimmers might find some comfort in the measurements from eight hot tubs, which were found to have far higher urine levels. One hotel Jacuzzi had more than three times the concentration of sweetener than in the worst swimming pool.

They used the average ACE concentration in Canadian urine to convert their measurements into approximate volumes of urine. While most people, beyond early childhood, would not admit to using their local swimming pool as a giant communal toilet, the results are not entirely surprising.