The same water, two categories
On this page11
The definition of a device
"Any instrument or contrivance (other than a firearm) intended for trapping, destroying, repelling, or mitigating any pest", excluding equipment used for the application of a pesticide when sold separately.
Which a water filter is
An instrument that removes or mitigates organisms. The pest, in the statute's terms, is the thing in the water.
And a device is not registered
Devices are not required to be registered under FIFRA section 3, which is the single biggest difference in cost and time between the two routes.
A halogen tablet is a different thing
A substance intended to destroy a pest, which is a pesticide, which has to be registered. The label then carries the registration number and the establishment number.
So the container tells you which it is
An EPA registration number on a label means a registered pesticide. No number on a product that makes a microbiological claim means either a device or a problem.
Which is a useful thing for a buyer to know
And a dangerous thing to get wrong in copy. A product sold as a device that is really a substance is an unregistered pesticide.
The exclusion in the definition matters
Equipment used for applying a pesticide, sold separately, is not a device. A pump or a dropper sold for dosing a chemical treatment is neither a device nor the pesticide.
Where that lands for this catalog
A container sold to hold a treatment chemical is not itself regulated by any of this. The obligations belong to whoever is marketing the treatment.
But the label on it is
If you are the one selling the treatment in our bottle, the labeling requirements are yours, and the next page sets out which ones survive the registration exemption.
And this property does not print performance numbers
The log-reduction figures everybody quotes come from an EPA guide standard rather than a codified rule. Those are numbers somebody drinks on and they are not going on a page from this catalog.