Chlorine shortage impacting local water parks and pool supply stores

PANAMA CITY BEACH, Fla. (WJHG/WECP) - Pool supplies were in high demand during the pandemic as more people stayed in and enjoyed their summer at home during 2020.

When a swimming pool chemical plant in Louisiana caught on fire last summer, the prices of pool supplies began to increase. Now in 2021 supplies are still scarce and prices for chlorine have also increased.

“We are beyond about a 25% increase of where we have been in the past,” Shipwreck Island Waterpark General Manager Buddy Wilkes said.

Local pool supply stores say they have had a hard time keeping chlorine products in stock.

Pool owners are also having to pay more to keep their pools clean.

Shipwreck Island Water Park General Manager Buddy Wilkes tells us the park has 3 million gallons of water that they have to keep treated with chlorine.

“We are at about three times higher on a daily basis throughout the park than the requirement in the state of Florida by the minimums that they set. It is a safe amount of chlorine in the water and it protects our guests better than just being at the minimum numbers,” Wilkes said.

Something Wilkes says the park will never stop doing, no matter how much the cost for chlorine goes up.

“We would never, I don’t care how high chlorine gets, we are never going to stay away from our normal protocol and the criteria we set with chlorine bleaching the water. So we are always going to have really clean water,” Wilkes said.

Supply stores say, if the shortage goes on for much longer they might see an increase in customers switching to the saltwater option for pools.

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