Not totally OT: health and healthy water

[1happygirl]

PBT (Paceline Brain Trust-ers)

I don't trust the water in the ol pipes, so instead of testing I just wanna go the Ozarka, Music Mountain. etc cooler route

I am also doing it to decrease my carbon footprint and quit amassing the large amounts of plastic bottles around the Casa/Haus. (ok Ya got me this is a main reason)

Question: How do you tell if the jug/bottled water is safe? I don't wanna jump out of the bad pipe into the bad water cooler so to speak so...

Are there any organizations/websites etc that test / rank these companies and their water? Any that you guys (gals) trust?
Can't make heads or tails of the NWT (water foundation website) that I found so… Whaddya all say?
As always, thanks in advance for your time.

[sg8357]

How about a reverse osmosis filter for the city water ?
I use a Culligan, lower carbon foot print, serviced a couple
times a year. Also removes fluoridation, so it is General Ripper
approved too.

The local TV station test 9 or so bottled waters and city water,
city water was cleaner than all but one bottled water.
Or looked at another way has less immune system building bugs.

[1happygirl]

How about a reverse osmosis filter for the city water ?
I use a Culligan, lower carbon foot print, serviced a couple
times a year. Also removes fluoridation, so it is General Ripper
approved too.


Hmm. didn't give it a thought. Thanks.

Probably more expensive than a monthly water service though, right?

[bluesea]

What about the benzine and possibly other carcinogens in plastic stored water? They say the big jugs are the worst. I myself am at an age where it doesn't matter any more, but for younger people...

[daker13]

I have local spring water delivered here in Rhode Island. They test it; it's pretty much a family operation, and tastes great. I don't know about the plastic dangers, but the stuff I get isn't really in the bottles for very long.

http://www.crystalspring.net/about.html

I use one of the porcelain dispensers and change the spigot every now and then. Maybe there's a local spring in your area?

If you're really willing to go all in for water, there's a website where they mark all the local natural springs around the world. I don't have the address handy, but if you're interested, I can try to find it. That's for the people who believe that only unadulterated, untouched spring water is worth drinking; you buy glass bottles and bottle it yourself.

[witcombusa]

Consider a Berkey gravity filter system (or one of their other options)

http://www.berkeywater.com/big-berkey-2-25-gal/

[dustyrider]

Not sure it's what you're looking for, and can't seem to find the example I've seen, but there are gravity filters that use various rocks/minerals to filter larger amounts of tap water. I just use the tap and refrigerated sans Pellegrino bottles.

[nublar]

Your local water agency may be required to produce annual water quality reports. For example, here is LA's:

http://dpw.lacounty.gov/wwd/web/YourWater/AnnualWaterQualityReports.aspx

[Seramount]

I work for the state regulatory agency that oversees public drinking water systems here in TX.

municipal water is either groundwater and/or surface water. groundwater sources only have to be disinfected with chlorine...SW systems have to use filtration, coagulation, and disinfection with chlorine or chloramines (chlorine + ammonia). in terms of public health, the quality of water is generally quite good. pathogenic organisms are eliminated quite effectively.

for my personal use, all I do to the municipal water is run it thru an undersink carbon filter. it knocks out the chlorine and improves the taste.

bottled water is a total scam. in TX, most of the bottled water sources are municipal water systems...not glaciers, springs, or other 'pure' sources. they simply run the city water thru an RO process and add minerals for taste...you're paying a tremendous upcharge for something that isn't any 'purer' than the original product.

[Schmed]

I'm in the water treatment industry.

What concerns you about the water in your pipes? You can have it tested, but testing for metals and bacteria is fairly cheap, but add pesticide and radionuclide testing, and it gets very expensive.

Reverse Osmosis (RO) removes metals and minerals (and chlorine, since it'll have a carbon filter as part of the system). Somewhat expensive, but probably the best choice.

Carbon filter alone removes chlorine and most pesticide type chemicals. Very inexpensive, and easy to change out.

Bottled water companies take tap water (typically) and RO it, UV/Ozone, put it in a bottle and ship it to you. From a carbon footprint perspective, an under-sink RO is the way to go.

If you want to remove the chlorine, keep a pitcher in the fridge and refill it as you drink it. Chlorine degrades after a few hours, so you'll have cheap chlorine-free water at all times!

Personally, I drink tap water. I'm more likely to be run over by a beer truck or strangled by my lovely wife because I left the toilet seat up (again!) than a few parts per trillion of arsenic in my tap water.

[pbarry]

Wow: Who knew there we several of us in the water industry?

You can definitely get RO/UV treated water in bulk in the Bay Area. Most healthy food stores have a dispenser and charge .25 - .50 per gallon for self-fill. If you are really concerned about drinking H2O quality, (and plastic bottle carcinogens), go the refill route and use glass 5 gallon bottles for containers.

[Veloo]

I bought a distiller several years ago and haven't looked back. Way cheaper than bottled and you don't have to keep a supply of the 4 litre jugs around taking up space.
All our guests comment on the clean/ pure taste. Tap water up here has that algae smell and gets worse in the summer. Makes me a bit nauseous.
The carbon filters are consumables to consider and I just clean the scales with vinegar.

http://www.ecopurewatershop.com/countertop-water-distiller-stainless-steel-glass-collection-bottle/

[Johnny P]

i work for the state regulatory agency that oversees public drinking water systems here in tx.

Municipal water is either groundwater and/or surface water. Groundwater sources only have to be disinfected with chlorine...sw systems have to use filtration, coagulation, and disinfection with chlorine or chloramines (chlorine + ammonia). In terms of public health, the quality of water is generally quite good. Pathogenic organisms are eliminated quite effectively.

For my personal use, all i do to the municipal water is run it thru an undersink carbon filter. It knocks out the chlorine and improves the taste.

Bottled water is a total scam. In tx, most of the bottled water sources are municipal water systems...not glaciers, springs, or other 'pure' sources. They simply run the city water thru an ro process and add minerals for taste...you're paying a tremendous upcharge for something that isn't any 'purer' than the original product.

+1

[texbike]

Water? Like from the toilet???

Have you considered drinking Brawndo instead? It has electrolytes!

Plus, it's got what plants crave! :)

Texbike

[1happygirl]

Thanks so much everyone. Wanting to get rid of the waste and possible toxins that I was trying to prevent with my pipes by going away from the toxins and plastic waste in bottles as I said. Didn't consider (or forgot) the possible Benzene in the plastic jugs.
I never considered carbon thinking that would disintegrate as I have had water before with the flecks of black (I'm assuming it was from a carbon filter lol)
This has helped me so much. Thank y'all for your time.
ANOTHER QUESTION if y'all don't mind?


Any ideas on the cost of the different methods suggested? Thanks again everyone.

[1happygirl]

I'm in the water treatment industry.

What concerns you about the water in your pipes? You can have it tested, but testing for metals and bacteria is fairly cheap, but add pesticide and radionuclide testing, and it gets very expensive.
snipped
yep here and wanting to remove floride too I suppose

[1happygirl]

for my personal use, all I do to the municipal water is run it thru an undersink carbon filter. it knocks out the chlorine and improves the taste.




Thanks so much!!
Any ideas on who/what? Do I need it pro installed and require mucho upkeep once installed?

SG suggested something called culligan but no dealers near me or anything.

[Black Dog]

yep here and wanting to remove floride too I suppose

Test your water before you spend money on a problem that may not be real. As for getting rid of fluoride...why? There are places that have naturally high levels of fluoride (much higher than municipal fluoridation levels) in the drinking water and the only health indictor that is different than normal is lower tooth decay (this is how they discovered the effect of fluoride). There is no evidence that fluorinating water does any harm to human health. Don't forget there is decades of data on millions of people to back this up in comparison to areas that do not fluorinate. Most municipal water supplies in North America and Europe are way safer than the vast majority of bottled water. The testing standards and regulations are much more rigourous.

[1happygirl]

Test your water before you spend money on a problem that may not be real. snipped here The testing standards and regulations are much more rigourous.

Assuming your muni tests. Got a note they screwed up and didn't test for all of 2014 or something or other. LOL that was interesting mail!!! yep for sure, but the taste too, in addition to the above things I mentioned.

[Spinner]

You can enter your zip code at the following site to determine the content of your water: www.ewg.org/tap-water

You can also go to the following to identify appropriate water filters: www.ewg.org/tap-water/getwaterfilter

You may also be able to find a local spring by going to: www.findaspring.com

Spring water is best stored in a glass carboy, available at any wine making store.

Cheers.

[Seramount]

Assuming your muni tests. Got a note they screwed up and didn't test for all of 2014 or something or other. LOL that was interesting mail!!! yep for sure, but the taste too, in addition to the above things I mentioned.

ok, here we go...hopefully this will be useful.

public water systems (PWS) are required to issue Consumer Confidence Reports annually to update customers on any issues or violations incurred during the year.

PWS are required to monitor their distribution systems for bacteria (a convenience store with a well may collect one per month, large cities may collect multi-hundreds of samples per month). samples are initially tested for a common, harmless type called coliform...if one tests positive, there's a secondary test for the fecal indicator organism (E. coli).

if a sample result is positive, the PWS must collect 'repeat' samples to determine if there's actually contamination in the system or just at the sample site. depending on the number and type of positives, a PWS may be issued various violations. in the event of an Acute Maximum Contaminant violation, they will be required to issue a Boil Water Notice.

your PWS may have simply erred in the number of samples collected or failed to collect repeats. some violations are even issued over things such as mis-labeling samples submitted to the lab. it would be HIGHLY unusual for a system to not conduct any monitoring for an entire year...

as far as testing your water, the acute health issue is pathogenic organisms...some waterborne diseases can be immediately fatal to infants, elderly, or those with compromised immune systems. other contaminants, such as metals, VOCs, SVOCs, pesticides, etc. pose chronic issues that typically don't manifest a health problem for years, if not decades.

a coliform test costs around $30...chemical analyses can run into the hundreds or thousands. it's fairly easy to decide which is more protective and economical for the average consumer.

look on ebay for activated carbon (charcoal) water filter systems...there's lots of types, sizes, and prices. the undersink or whole-house units are much more practical over the long-term than the dinky ones that go on the end of a faucet.

taste and odor complaints are not uncommon for a variety of factors. they do not necessarily indicate that the water is not safe to drink, tho. my city's surface water source experiences algal blooms each summer...the water tastes 'grassy,' but still meets all federal requirements. my carbon filter takes care of this as well as the chloramines.

I know the filter works because I put water from it directly into my freshwater aquarium and the fish suffer no ill effects. chloramines are deadly to fish.

[Black Dog]

^^^this. Reason. :)

[Jaq]

yep here and wanting to remove floride too I suppose

General Ripper agrees.