The deception behind the bottled water industry - Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community

keyshawn · 02-18-2006, 11:00 AM

Hey,

I recently attended a panel talk at school about bottled water. It always had seemed a bit fishy to me that some bottles had said 'purified' or 'mineral' water to me, and I considered myself naive even then (after all, EVIAN, a french bottled water company, is spelled naive backwards

) that the bottled water was somehow better than tap. But after attending the panel and reading a bit more about it, I've found out that bottled water has minimal regulation and the bottled water is more likely to taste fishy than tap water itself.

Bottled water is not necessarily safer than your tap water (1).
I was a bit disturbed by reading that the pollution is not just from the constant extraction of water from the earth.
To reach Americans' demand for bottled water requires more than 1.5 million barrels of oil annually, enough to fuel some 100,000 U.S. cars for a year (2). Granted, the convenience of traveling around with a bottle of water is nice. In third world countries where the public drinking water is not always truly safe, the bottled water can be very useful. However, here in the first-worlds, we use tons of bottles each time.
Suggestions to end the bottled water theory include to just use one plastic water bottle (a Nalgene one, which are pretty trendy here at my college) over and over and fill it up with tap water each time for trips.
When I went on a 3 week trip to Europe a couple years ago, I refilled my bottle every morning before going out. I ended up staying hydrated the entire time and save money by not having to buy bottled water.

Either for economical or environmental reasons, it really doesn't pay to go with bottled water.

regards,
will.

(If the intro paragraph is a bit unclear, well, sorry for that. I'm using experimenting with other writing styles. I've been struggling a bit in school with my writing structure, so I tried with the 'catchy' hook in the beginning. I know I'm very crudely citing sources at the end, like an academic paper, but it's a concept (of citing sources) that needs to be done more on the TFP, and especially, the internet in general. By citing sources, it encourages authors to verify their facts, and gives readers a reference point if they would like to do more research on the subject. Also, I'm aware that I sort of just slacked off on the issue a bit, I'll probably edit it some more in a bit.

[some sources:]
(2)
http://news.yahoo.com/s/oneworld/200...NlYwMlJVRPUCUl

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/01/op...SYSTEM_IS_EVIL

http://www.polarisinstitute.org/pola.../articles.html

http://www.epa.gov/OGWDW/wot/pdfs/bo...ontap_full.pdf

(1) http://www.nps.gov/public_health/int.../faq_dw.htm#15

http://www.nrdc.org/water/drinking/qbw.asp

http://www.epa.gov/safewater/standards.html

Brewmaniac · 02-18-2006, 01:17 PM

It totaly amazes me how stupid people can be, I've never understood the whole bottled water thing in the US we have water plants with strict standards. Are we that influenced by marketing?

snowy · 02-18-2006, 01:27 PM

The NYTimes just had an article about this in their food section:

Quote:

IN 1977 the American public saw its first television commercial for bottled water. Orson Welles crooned about a place in the south of France where "there is a spring, and its name is Perrier," and the response was feverish. American sales of Perrier went up more than 3,000 percent from 1976 to 1979.

"I remember thousands of us running in Perrier T-shirts in the 1979 marathon," said Johanna Raymond, a New Yorker. "Perrier was the coolest thing then. It was more than water."

Since Perrier's introduction, the American market for bottled water has grown from almost nothing into the world's largest. The Beverage Marketing Corporation, the industry's main research group, says that Americans spent more than $9 billion on bottled water in 2004 (the latest year for which complete figures are available) and that the product's rate of growth was almost 10 percent a year for the previous 10 years, something almost unheard of in food marketing. "There appears to be no limit," said Gary Hemphill, an analyst with the beverage marketing group, "to how thirsty Americans are."

Nor to the ways the bottlers sell water. The forests of France and the hills of Maine quickly evolved into Icelandic glaciers and Pacific aquifers, and for the 40 percent of bottled waters that are made from municipal tap water, bottlers tout arcane methods of distillation and filtration and add minerals to get a better, more "watery" taste. Now, the selling point is often not the water, but what's in it: the flavorings, the vitamins, the stimulants and other "enhancements" that are supposed to be an improvement on simple H2O.

From those first irresistible green bottles of Perrier, Americans have been positively cultish about water. "I could not get through the day without Poland Spring," said Mark Swigart, a pharmaceutical sales representative in the Boston area. "And sometimes for a special treat I'll spring for a bottle of Fiji or Volvic."

Industry analysts say consumers have embraced bottled water as a healthy alternative to soda, still the most popular beverage in the country. But when is water no longer water? In the nation's refrigerator cases, we rifle through bottles of vitamin water, energy water, fitness water and fruit water, all of them variations on water, flavoring, coloring and often sweetener.

For years Gatorade was alone in the field of "enhanced" waters, water with additives that may have specific health benefits, including vitamins and minerals like electrolytes and salts. But no longer. In 2004 Pepsi sold $256 million worth of Propel Fitness Water, which it introduced in 2000. "I used to drink way too much soda, but now I drink five or six Propels a day, usually melon and kiwi-strawberry," said Jerry Fox, an environmental consultant in Girdwood, Alaska.

If it is artificially flavored with passion fruit, sweetened with Splenda and colored with yellow dye No. 5, is it still water? When I read the ingredients of a popular flavored water to Marion Nestle, a professor of nutrition at New York University, she said the beverage was technically indistinguishable from diet soda, except for the carbonation. "If it's sweetened, it might as well be soda, nutritionally speaking," she said. "It's not really water."

Nearly 200 new waters and "water beverages" were introduced last year, a virtual ocean infused with such diverse enhancements as the melt-offs of glaciers and icebergs, appetite suppressants, black truffles, caffeine, ginseng, vitamins, "superoxygen," cucumbers and even Sylvester Stallone. (Sly Pure Glacial Water, from the "10,000-year-old Carbon Glacier on the north face of Mount Rainier," will be released next month.) Zodiac's Bio-2 water claims to have changed the molecular structure of water in ways that increase an athlete's stamina. Icelandic Glacial is a "superpremium" water from a spring shielded from pollution "by an impenetrable barrier of lava rock." (The Food and Drug Administration does not regulate terms like "enhanced" and "flavored" or claims like "crystalline" and "vibrational." But water labeled spring, artesian or mineral must be bottled directly at the source.)

Jana Skinny Water says its product "helps curb appetite" with hydroxycitric acid, although it does not mention that all water has the same effect if you drink enough of it. In interviews with dozens of water drinkers, most of them said they chose bottled water for the convenience and the taste, not the supposed benefits.

"A bottle of fancy water is like a harmless little luxury," said April Ferrone, a real estate broker who lives outside Albany.

But an increasing number of health and environmental activists are challenging the nutritional claims and also the harmlessness of the bottled-water business.

"First of all, water is water is water," said Dr. Nestle, author of the forthcoming "What to Eat" (North Point Press) and a frequent critic of food marketers. "Second, tap water in the developed world is not only cleaner than bottled water, but it has fluoride, which most bottled water does not.

"Mostly, you are paying for the convenience of the bottle," she added.

"More than any other product, the buying and selling of water is an industry based on nothing," said Menno Liauw, a Dutch advertising executive and a founder of the Neau Foundation, which pokes fun at bottled water, but with a pointed purpose.

Neau, a nonprofit organization based in Amsterdam, has one goal (raising money for drinking-water projects in third world countries) and one product: an empty blue plastic bottle, for about $2, with a glossy logo and a flier inside explaining that profits are donated to the foundation's water projects. The buyer is expected to fill the bottle with tap water. "Two thousand liters of tap water cost less than one liter of Spa," a popular Dutch mineral water, Mr. Liauw said. Ethos Water, an American company that sponsors similar drinking-water projects, was bought by Starbucks in 2005; 5 cents for each bottle sold is donated to water charities.

This month the Earth Policy Institute, an environmental association based in Washington, published a research paper outlining the global issues raised by bottled water. "Water is very heavy, and moving large quantities of it, for example, 8,000 miles from Fiji to New York, takes considerable resources," said Janet Larsen, the institute's director of research. "Nearly a quarter of all bottled water around the world crosses national borders to get to its market. Bottled water is not a global environmental crisis in itself, but it is an issue of global equity and of human rights; we believe clean water is a basic human right."

In the United States, water politics have led some communities to resist incursions by the world's bottlers. A group called Michigan Citizens for Water Conservation has pursued a five-year lawsuit against Nestlé, the owner of Perrier, Poland Spring, Ice Mountain and other brands. When Nestlé was temporarily barred from pumping water from a spring on private land in Mecosta County, the city of Evart, Mich., stepped in and offered to sell Nestlé rights to some of its municipal well water, causing a public outcry. "This water belongs to the people of Michigan, who will end up paying for it again when it is put in a bottle," said Terry Swier, the group's president.

Other activists see the bottles as more problematic than the water. The plastic used for bottling water is food-safe PET, polyethylene terephthalate, which is itself made from crude oil. It was the invention of PET in the 1970's that made the portable water bottle possible. Now, according to the Container Recycling Institute, a California-based group, about 90 percent of PET bottles tossed out by Americans end up not in recycling centers but in landfills, at a rate of 30 million a day. "There is a huge amount of byproduct associated with bottled water," said Kellogg J. Schwab, associate professor at the Johns Hopkins University Center for Water and Health. PET is considered safe for the drinking public, and can be washed and reused, but nutrition activists have raised concerns about its long-term health risks. Dr. Schwab says that little is known about water stored in PET over long periods and at high temperatures.

Americans are just becoming aware that a bottle of water may have its own hidden costs. At Berkeley High School in the California Bay Area, bottled water was removed from the cafeteria six weeks ago and replaced by coolers filled with filtered tap water; students fill PET bottles or reusable Nalgene flasks, a badge of cool for young hipsters. Last month a Colorado company launched the first spring water bottled in a new kind of biodegradable plastic called PLA, which is made from corn. (PLA is used by Newman's Own in its food packaging.) Bottles of Biota spring water are designed to break down at high temperatures when empty, making them not only biodegradable but compostable.

Gretchen Rubin, a writer in Manhattan, says that bottled water has gone from a pet peeve to a crusade for her. "I absolutely refuse to buy it and once shocked a group of parents when I wouldn't buy water for my daughter at the playground," she said. "Remember water fountains? This is America! Our water is drinkable!"

From: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/15/dining/15water.html

Personally, I only buy bottled water when I have to. I'm perfectly fine getting it out of a drinking fountain, though. I studied watershed management extensively in high school and so I know where my water comes from (part comes from Coastal Range resevoirs and part comes from the Willamette River). But the fact is, the water is cleaned and purified so well that it's unlikely you'll consume anything funky. In fact, most bottled waters have higher bacteria levels than municipal tap water. Sure, tap water might not taste the greatest--that's what Brita pitchers are for.

Something I find funny: I conducted a taste test on various friends and family members using well water from my folks' well in rural Washington and a bottle of Arrowhead. I asked them which sample they thought was the bottled water. ALL of them picked the well water.

My parents buy bottled water despite the great well, though--mostly as a "reserve" supply in case the pump from the well goes out

Fremen · 02-18-2006, 02:37 PM

I don't know what it is around here, but tapwater tastes good in my home, but a half-mile down the road at a friend's house (using the same water company) it tastes hmmmm....mineral-y I guess you would say. Not good at all.

Siege · 02-18-2006, 02:57 PM

I just don't like the flavour of my tap water. Maybe it's just my tap water, maybe it's just me. Usually, I only care about flavour if i'm drinking it as refreshment. If i'm using it to keep me hydrated, I don't really care where it comes from.

As for taste tests, I believe ebaumsworld has a video of people drinking hose water thinking that it was $5 or so bottles of water. They all said it tasted great

(or at least those they showed anyway...i'm sure there are people who can taste the difference)

Zeraph · 02-18-2006, 03:09 PM

It's not just you Siege. My tap water tastes like crap, but at my dad's house and grandpa's house the tap water is fine.

Charlatan · 02-18-2006, 03:42 PM

I drink tap water all the time.

cyrnel · 02-18-2006, 04:18 PM

Filters are cheap. It costs <$50 for a good under-sink model and a sink tap. The filter is good for a year, and it's FAST. Buy another cartridge for $8-11/yr depending on paranoia level. Suddenly the nastiest tapwater tastes great.

Anybody up for an analysis of the environmental damage caused by bottled-water vs. SUVs?

ubertuber · 02-18-2006, 04:21 PM

Our tap water is surprisingly good here... On the other hand, my grandparents live in Odessa, TX where the water smells so foul you're afraid to wash your hands with it.

Grasshopper Green · 02-18-2006, 05:08 PM

I buy bottled water because I despise the taste of my tapwater. I don't even make tea or oatmeal with it because I can still taste it. I think a brita pitcher sounds like a good investment though. I *do* recycle all my bottles at least.

When I was first in college, my friends and I would bring empty 2 liter bottles "home" when we'd visit our parents houses and bring back tapwater from where we grew up, because it tasted fine there. Salt Lake water is just nasty.

Borla · 02-18-2006, 05:29 PM

Here is my personal story of the irony of bottled water........

I live in Illinois. It seems that the attraction many bottles water brands key in on is that they are from somewhere else, that is supposed to be cleaner, more pure, or at least "different" from where the consumer is. Different MUST be better, right?

Well, I took a trip several years ago to the back woods of Manitoba. A place that seemed incredibly clean, pure, and unpolluted to me. We fished and enjoyed the wild for over a week. The water was so clean we drank it out of the river, and the running water was actually from a hose with a sand filter at the end, no other treatment. One day we drove to the nearest outpost and I happened to see some bottled water. I looked closer, and it was from Illinois!!!!

Here the water is from Canada, or France, or some place with glaciers. There, I saw water from Illinois.

Martian · 02-18-2006, 05:29 PM

I never understood why people complain about paying $1.00 for a litre of gasoline but will pay $1.50 for half a litre of stuff that comes out of the taps for free.

One of the first things I invested in when I moved out on my own was a brita pitcher and even that isn't strictly necessary; the tap water here isn't really all that bad. Coming from my hometown where the water is terrible, it was more habit than anything else.

Sage · 02-18-2006, 05:40 PM

I grew up drinking water straight out of a mountain spring, so I'm very picky about the taste of my water. The tap water here is simply HORRID, so Martel and I buy gallons of water from the grocery store- they take the tap water and use reverse osmosis to get most of the junk out. Tastes fine to me- not quite like the water at my parent's house, but still decent.

The only bottled water that I really "like" is DaSani- it just.... tastes the closest to my parent's water. Martel says that's because it's fortified with dirt

Willravel · 02-18-2006, 06:08 PM

Two words: reverse osmosis. Best water I've ever had. The only bottled water I'll drink is Fiji.

cyrnel · 02-18-2006, 06:09 PM

Wow. I just googled "plastic bottle resource requirements" and had to turn down the volume. Anyway, Dasani is mentioned prominently in the U.S. study.

<a href="http://www.breitbart.com/news/2006/02/10/060210151009.9nrba2js.html">AFP Story:</a>

Quote:

... The study warned that the rapid growth in the industry has also ironically led to water shortages in some areas, including India where bottling of Dasani water and other drinks by the Coca-Cola company has caused shortages in more than 50 villages. ...

That study mentions the water bottle manufacturing for U.S. consumption requires 1.5million barrels of oil/yr (raw materials only), but nothing about transportation of the product which I recall can be higher depending on product origin.

Ouch.

Craven Morehead · 02-18-2006, 08:56 PM

Maybe W.C. Fields was right all along.

Quote:

I never drink water because of the disgusting things that fish do in it.

Da Munk · 02-18-2006, 09:12 PM

The tap water here is disgusting and highly chlorinated, so I try to avoid drinking it unless it's filtered.

RallyEX · 02-18-2006, 09:27 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Borla

It seems that the attraction many bottles water brands key in on is that they are from somewhere else, that is supposed to be cleaner, more pure, or at least "different" from where the consumer is. Different MUST be better, right?

The grass is always greener on the other side.

I live in southeastern ohio, and the water here has a unique odor / flavor to it that you can sometimes taste through food cooked with it and beverages made with it. I have become accustomed to the odor / flavor, so it doesn't bother me THAT much.

BUT my wife and I do consume only bottled water right now... here's why: I live near a DuPont plant that produces Teflon. There is a chemical used in Teflon production called C8 which DuPont has been leaking it into the groundwater, unbeknownst to residents. The longstanding effects of the chemical are unknown, but it accumulates in the blood and remains there for a long time. A class action lawsuit against DuPont was settled with them funding a health study on C8, the building of filters to get rid of it and free bottled water for families living in affected areas until the filters are in place and tested.

We were receiving water from Culligan, however the cost was high and the project switched to a cheap local company... who barely filters the water before it hits the bottles. It was discovered that bottled water, supposedly free from C8 and being given to people who didn't want to consume the chemical, was full of the stuff we were so focused on trying to avoid. Needless to say, a choice was given to no longer consume the bottled water containing C8 and go to Culligan or another supplier.

The popularity of bottled water can be attributed to many things... Marketing, trends, paranoia, convenience. Personally, I don't drink that much water, but when I do, the tap water would be fine... until we found out that we had our very own Erin Brockovich-style issue going on right in our back yard.

Carno · 02-18-2006, 09:30 PM

A lot of people who buy bottled water from "exotic" locations are usually douchie fuckfaces.

Willravel · 02-18-2006, 09:35 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Carn

A lot of people who buy bottled water from "exotic" locations are usually douchie fuckfaces.

What if they buy it cause it tastes good? I drink Fiji every once in a while (when i can't get home). It's good, and I'm satisfied that it's no worse than tap water or any other bottled water, in fact it is more pure than the tap at my house before my reverse osmosis system.

Carno · 02-18-2006, 09:44 PM

I dunno, I've never seen that Fijian stuff before. And I don't think I've ever had someone tell me they drink bottled water because it tastes good. But a lot of people at my school walk around with bottled water because they think it makes them look cool or something. They talk about how the water is made from faery piss or some glacier that's 4564564 million years old and how it's soooo good for you and other stupid shit.

Man I hate those people.

yellowchef · 02-19-2006, 12:02 AM

I drink it out of convience but i dont buy it regularly. my tap water tastes ok... and we have a filter.. or if im feeling extra good Ill lug some jugs to work and fill them from the filtered water there.

but yeah Im in culinary school and people have the dumbest reasons for drinking bottled water. I buy bottled water to bake with, mainly bread because of the chlorine used in tap water so it doesnt fuck up my baking.... but otherwise Id drink water from a hose...

and i have

I dont like dasani, it tastes like dirt.

So does Evian.

Bill O'Rights · 02-19-2006, 12:04 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fremen

I don't know what it is around here, but tapwater tastes good in my home, but a half-mile down the road at a friend's house (using the same water company) it tastes hmmmm....mineral-y I guess you would say. Not good at all.

My guess...mineral deposits in your friends pipes. Especially if it's an older home. It may, for that matter, even have lead pipes. That part is doubtfull though. Still...possible.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sage

I grew up drinking water straight out of a mountain spring...

Me too.

In fact, just a few years ago my parents were visited by a water purification system salesman. He brought out his test equipment, and tested the water straight out of the tap. Not once. Not twice. But three times. Finally, he put his equipment away, and told my parents..."I'm sorry, there's nothing that I can do for you.". Turns out that their water supply, straight out of the spring, and only particle filtered, is 99.9% pure.

I tried to get dad to invest in some plastic bottles, and some fancy labels. Hell, he's retired...he can stand at the kitchen sink filling bottles all day long.

snowy · 02-19-2006, 12:59 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bill O'Rights

I tried to get dad to invest in some plastic bottles, and some fancy labels. Hell, he's retired...he can stand at the kitchen sink filling bottles all day long.

Hmm...that could be a moneymaker for my folks...

Sweetpea · 02-19-2006, 01:36 AM

i have a brita water filter because we do have some particulates in our tap water here at home

bottled water is a crock in my opinion

sweetpea

moot1337 · 02-19-2006, 01:51 AM

Bottled water is silly most of the time... unless it's purified by reverse osmosis or just straight distillation, it's just the same water that comes out of your tap (usually). Have you seen the ads for this new Penta water stuff? They claim to have altered the molecular structure of H2O to make it more hydrating... well, not that you wouldn't have guessed this, but Penta water is exactly the same as any other filtered water... its molecular structure is unchanged, and there are even the exact same amount of H30+ and OH- ions floating around in it, making it the same substance inside every other bottle of bullcrap sold out there.

Chlorine is a serious chemical though, which is why I usually let water from my tap sit in an open container for a while before giving it to any of my plants, or myself. Nalgene bottles really are wonderful things, ya dig?

To expand upon the DuPont thing: the C-8 contamination is actually so widespread and has been going on for so long that it can be found in the blood of nearly every American - not just those in the high contamination areas. It's a chemical used in the manufacture of teflon, or, more specifically, the binding of teflon to metal, and isn't present in the final product... yet, somehow, it's found its way into groundwater and air just about everywhere, and eventually into our bloodstreams.

The good news is that it's not incredibly harmful - the trace amounts we have in our bloodstreams probably won't do much, with regard to birth defects, new diseases, and the like. Flourinated compounds are relatively stable because of how tightly flourine holds onto molecular bonds, but this does mean that its rate of degradation in the environment is VERY slow. Chlorinated compounds are much, much more toxic, as chlorine ionizes pretty easily, and can do some wonky shit to organisms - there's a reason why the French use Ozone, rather than chlorine, to purify their water.

The thing I find disturbing, though, is that DuPont continues to release this substance into air and water, as they have for more than 3 decades. They know that in large quantities, c-8 is harmful to human development, and they even know how to manufacture teflon without this chemical, but, because of the profit involved, they simply carry on. I've moved away from teflon products not because they're a particular health risk (though they do outgas above 300F) but because of that company's work ethic, which is one of lies, deceit, and greed. I encourage everyone to try out hard-anodized aluminum instead of teflon when you can, as it's much more durable and (usually) doesn't benefit such an underhanded company.

aKula · 02-19-2006, 03:02 AM

In Germany everyone drinks bottled water. But they have a sane system there where the water is bought in glass bottles. You return these glass bottles (which are re-used) and obtain a large discount on your next purchase (it is even cheaper in Italy). Here in Australia they don't have such a system but we still buy bottled water. Firstly it's carbonated, something I am used to and makes it more enjoyable to drink. Then there is no chlorine or fluoride in the water, the first of which tastes bad, the second of which is bad for you. My doctor recently said that I should not drink any tap water as it could be the cause of eczema on my hands.

In conclusion bottled water is not a bad thing if there is a system in place whereby glass bottles are returned and re-used. It makes it better for the consumer, the producer and the environment.

analog · 02-19-2006, 03:57 AM

The US, and many other governments, regulates the quality (safety) of tap water. If you're on a well, it may or may not be regulated properly.

I don't care what is said about tap water vs. bottle water... some tap water tastes like absolute shit (and some bottled water, too), and I could care less if it's "safe". Safe is good- but if it tastes terrible where you are, then it tastes terrible.

At least in the US, bottled water still has to pass minimal safety testing.

So really it comes down to taste. Depending on where I am (and I love drinking water), i either enjoy it from the tap or find it horrid-tasting. That's just a personal preference.

And poke fun at Evian all you want... I don't care what they claim, I don't care if it's really the purest water on the planet (or not)- it tastes good to me, and I will buy it however often I feel like it.

I have to have good water, though... I have a really good purifier hooked up to the tap. I fill 2-liter bottles (not old soda ones, they're a different shape), one at a time, and keep them both in the refrigerator. I rotate two, so while i'm using one, the other is sitting in the back for a few days, and the water tastes that much better.

etla · 02-19-2006, 09:52 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by aKula

In conclusion bottled water is not a bad thing if there is a system in place whereby glass bottles are returned and re-used. It makes it better for the consumer, the producer and the environment.

Glass uses just as much oil as plastic, the transportation costs are so high.

etla · 02-19-2006, 09:54 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by moot1337

The thing I find disturbing, though, is that DuPont continues to release this substance into air and water, as they have for more than 3 decades. They know that in large quantities, c-8 is harmful to human development, and they even know how to manufacture teflon without this chemical, but, because of the profit involved, they simply carry on. I've moved away from teflon products not because they're a particular health risk (though they do outgas above 300F) but because of that company's work ethic, which is one of lies, deceit, and greed. I encourage everyone to try out hard-anodized aluminum instead of teflon when you can, as it's much more durable and (usually) doesn't benefit such an underhanded company.

Unless your a hermit in the woods I don't think you can boycot DuPont.

Trisk · 02-19-2006, 01:12 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by etla

Glass uses just as much oil as plastic, the transportation costs are so high.

Yeah, but at least with glass, after all the oil used to transport it, it's not going to end up in landfills by the millions.

lol, I was also about to type something about how flouride isn't bad for you in small quantities, because I know the American Dental Society reccomends a certain amount be added to tapwater. And then I read this (PDF document) and this.
Sigh. Now I'm paranoid. My teeth are mottled.

I have seen a few presentations about water recently also, and it scares me. Not just the bottled water industry, but just...water everywhere. I don't remember specifics so I'm not going to go into that right now, but just look up something like "worldwide water shortage" on google. It's really alarming.

Wyckd · 02-19-2006, 01:32 PM

i live in los angeles, and the tap water here TASTES horrible... and not only in my home.. but every restaurant i go to in or outside of Los Angeles, when they serve water. its tap water.. and i can totally taste the funkiness of it..

bottled water tastes clean...

some cleaner and more refreshing than others.. but generally doesnt have the tap water taste.

billege · 02-20-2006, 11:29 AM

I wanted to comment on this one, though most good points have already been made.

I think that a lot of people commonly forget that money is a system of valuation, not just made up numbers applied to products. Money is a great concept that enables me to say “society thinks my 8 hours at my desk today is worth $X” and also “the resources spent in making this shirt, or bottle of water, are worth this.”

Given that system of valuation, it’s easy to tell if how much effort went into whatever it is you’re buying. That’s what money does for us.

My point segues to the article’s mention of how many gallons of oil is used in the bottled water industry. That’s some false logic thrown out to insinuate that bottled water is some kind of great oil waster. Well, the thing is that every product (just about) has some energy consumed to make it. I can’t imagine one that doesn’t. Does it take the burning of oil to get my bottle of water to my desk? Of course it does. But the thinking can’t stop there. It also took burring of oil to get the Twinkie to my desk; but, no one’s going to vilify Twinkies by compiling a statement like “Twinkies are responsible for the use of XX gallons of oil!” Because that’s true for just about every consumer product there is.

Think about this product: Dirt.

That’s right, Dirt. Bagged dirt. Lowe’s and Home Depot have tons of dirt in bags. I can go buy dirt, because it’s better than the dirt I already have. At some point that bagged dirt was not in bags. A bulldozer, that likely runs on diesel, scooped up the dirt and took it to a dump truck. The dump truck burned some more fuel taking the dirt to a machine that surely runs on electricity, or I guess, more oil. Either way, something used energy to get the dirt into bags. Then someone put the bags on a pallet, that a forklift burned more petrochemicals to move to a truck. The semi burned more oil to bring the dirt to a store, where I bought it under lights lit by other fossil fuels (I live in OH, 90% of our generation is coal), off a cash register that runs on electricity. Then I put the dirt in my car, which burned MORE petrochemicals to get it home. Then I put the dirt on top of the dirt I already had. Now how does one sum up the value for all of those resources expended? With money, that’s how. I paid $x for the bag of dirt, and that summed the value of every bit of energy expended in getting that dirt to me. If someone with a lot of spare time wanted to, they could figure out that X% of the $Y spent was for the cost of transport, IE fuel costs. In fact, a dedicated individual could figure out how much oil was used from start to finish, and go on the warpath against the frivolous use of oil for moving dirt.

My point is that it takes oil to get a Twinkie on your desk, a bag of dirt on your garden, a hotdog at the game, or that bottle of water in your hand. The value of everything that went into that water is contained in the cost charged for it. The bottle of water in my hand costs $0.25 (a 20 pack for $5). Some percentage of the 25 cents went for the cost of oil. Though the aggregate might sound impressive, but it’s not really at all.

kutulu · 02-20-2006, 12:49 PM

I don't buy much bottled water but I don't drink tap water. The tap water in the Phoenix area tastes like ass. It's horrible. I get my water from the water store. I use a 5 gallon bottle and it's between 0.25-0.35/gallon depending on what place I go to. Since I don't clean the crock and bottle as much as I should, it's probably not as healthy as tap water but we aren't getting sick from it and it tastes great. The water stores use RO, de-ionization, UV filtering, charcoal filtering, and a couple other methods. It gets rid of all the bad tastes that are in our tap water.

I've tried Brita filters, they are useless. I don't notice any taste change.

samcol · 02-20-2006, 02:37 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by willravel

Two words: reverse osmosis. Best water I've ever had. The only bottled water I'll drink is Fiji.

Fiji is absolutely the best bottled water in my opinion. Second would be Evian I guess.

splck · 02-20-2006, 05:22 PM

I'll buy bottled water if I'm away from home, but while home it's the tap for me. Bottled water is a supreme wast of money.

msh58 · 02-20-2006, 05:35 PM

i drink nothing but tap water and yeah i guess it shows

AngelicVampire · 02-20-2006, 06:01 PM

Out of curiosity what is reverse osmosis? Osmosis is "The diffusion of water across a semi-permeable membrane along a concentration gradient" (yay 4th-5th year Biology... I wrote that so many times) so what does the reverse bit do? Googling it seems to turn up Osmosis results (How Stuff Works).
Edit- Found it, reverse osmosis takes salt/other water and reverses the osmosis process... basically rather than taking nice clean water and filtering it we waste a lot of power/time cleaning dirty water, thus polluting more of our nice clean water... odd concept but if it pays!

In Britain our tap water is pretty nice, even through the lead pipes in my house (not been replaced since 1902 when the house was built!). Bottled water always seems a little like a con, it does seems safer than what comes out of some of my taps (its often slightly brown but perfectly healthy) but the cost is stupidly high... and isn't the only cost/pollution efficient recycling (other than bio matter) aluminium?

Nimetic · 02-20-2006, 06:25 PM

Just a quick question - what does letting the water sit do?

Does this allow the chlorine a bit of time to bind with organic stuff in the water or something?

Do you have any idea where in the water supply "process" chlorine is added?

splck · 02-20-2006, 07:14 PM

Letting water sit in an open container allows the chlorine to dissipate. You'll notice a big difference. Chloramine (chlorine and ammonia) treated water takes much longer to dissipate.

The chlorine or chloramine is added in secret little buildings somewhere between your tap and the well or reservoir.

02-18-2006, 11:00 AM	#1 (permalink)
keyshawn Psycho	The deception behind the bottled water industry Hey, I recently attended a panel talk at school about bottled water. It always had seemed a bit fishy to me that some bottles had said 'purified' or 'mineral' water to me, and I considered myself naive even then (after all, EVIAN, a french bottled water company, is spelled naive backwards ) that the bottled water was somehow better than tap. But after attending the panel and reading a bit more about it, I've found out that bottled water has minimal regulation and the bottled water is more likely to taste fishy than tap water itself. Bottled water is not necessarily safer than your tap water (1). I was a bit disturbed by reading that the pollution is not just from the constant extraction of water from the earth. To reach Americans' demand for bottled water requires more than 1.5 million barrels of oil annually, enough to fuel some 100,000 U.S. cars for a year (2). Granted, the convenience of traveling around with a bottle of water is nice. In third world countries where the public drinking water is not always truly safe, the bottled water can be very useful. However, here in the first-worlds, we use tons of bottles each time. Suggestions to end the bottled water theory include to just use one plastic water bottle (a Nalgene one, which are pretty trendy here at my college) over and over and fill it up with tap water each time for trips. When I went on a 3 week trip to Europe a couple years ago, I refilled my bottle every morning before going out. I ended up staying hydrated the entire time and save money by not having to buy bottled water. Either for economical or environmental reasons, it really doesn't pay to go with bottled water. regards, will. (If the intro paragraph is a bit unclear, well, sorry for that. I'm using experimenting with other writing styles. I've been struggling a bit in school with my writing structure, so I tried with the 'catchy' hook in the beginning. I know I'm very crudely citing sources at the end, like an academic paper, but it's a concept (of citing sources) that needs to be done more on the TFP, and especially, the internet in general. By citing sources, it encourages authors to verify their facts, and gives readers a reference point if they would like to do more research on the subject. Also, I'm aware that I sort of just slacked off on the issue a bit, I'll probably edit it some more in a bit. [some sources:] (2) http://news.yahoo.com/s/oneworld/200...NlYwMlJVRPUCUl http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/01/op...SYSTEM_IS_EVIL http://www.polarisinstitute.org/pola.../articles.html http://www.epa.gov/OGWDW/wot/pdfs/bo...ontap_full.pdf (1) http://www.nps.gov/public_health/int.../faq_dw.htm#15 http://www.nrdc.org/water/drinking/qbw.asp http://www.epa.gov/safewater/standards.html __________________ currently reading: currently playing :

02-18-2006, 01:17 PM	#2 (permalink)
Brewmaniac Searching for the perfect brew!	It totaly amazes me how stupid people can be, I've never understood the whole bottled water thing in the US we have water plants with strict standards. Are we that influenced by marketing? __________________ "That's a joke... I say, that's a joke, son"

02-18-2006, 02:37 PM	#4 (permalink)
Fremen With a mustache, the cool factor would be too much Location: left side of my couch, East Texas	I don't know what it is around here, but tapwater tastes good in my home, but a half-mile down the road at a friend's house (using the same water company) it tastes hmmmm....mineral-y I guess you would say. Not good at all. __________________ Google

02-18-2006, 02:57 PM	#5 (permalink)
Siege is a tiger Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada	I just don't like the flavour of my tap water. Maybe it's just my tap water, maybe it's just me. Usually, I only care about flavour if i'm drinking it as refreshment. If i'm using it to keep me hydrated, I don't really care where it comes from. As for taste tests, I believe ebaumsworld has a video of people drinking hose water thinking that it was $5 or so bottles of water. They all said it tasted great (or at least those they showed anyway...i'm sure there are people who can taste the difference) __________________ "Your name's Geek? Do you know the origin of the term? A geek is someone who bites the heads off chickens at a circus. I would never let you suck my dick with a name like Geek" --Kevin Smith This part just makes my posts easier to find

02-18-2006, 03:42 PM	#7 (permalink)
Charlatan Getting it. Super Moderator Location: Lion City	I drink tap water all the time. __________________ "My hands are on fire. Hands are on fire. Ain't got no more time for all you charlatans and liars." - Old Man Luedecke

02-18-2006, 03:09 PM	#6 (permalink)
Zeraph Banned Location: The Cosmos	It's not just you Siege. My tap water tastes like crap, but at my dad's house and grandpa's house the tap water is fine.

02-18-2006, 04:18 PM	#8 (permalink)
cyrnel Adequate Location: In my angry-dome.	Filters are cheap. It costs <$50 for a good under-sink model and a sink tap. The filter is good for a year, and it's FAST. Buy another cartridge for $8-11/yr depending on paranoia level. Suddenly the nastiest tapwater tastes great. Anybody up for an analysis of the environmental damage caused by bottled-water vs. SUVs? __________________ There are a vast number of people who are uninformed and heavily propagandized, but fundamentally decent. The propaganda that inundates them is effective when unchallenged, but much of it goes only skin deep. If they can be brought to raise questions and apply their decent instincts and basic intelligence, many people quickly escape the confines of the doctrinal system and are willing to do something to help others who are really suffering and oppressed." -Manufacturing Consent: Noam Chomsky and the Media, p. 195

02-18-2006, 04:21 PM	#9 (permalink)
ubertuber spudly Location: Ellay	Our tap water is surprisingly good here... On the other hand, my grandparents live in Odessa, TX where the water smells so foul you're afraid to wash your hands with it. __________________ Cogito ergo spud -- I think, therefore I yam

02-18-2006, 05:08 PM	#10 (permalink)
Grasshopper Green ...is a comical chap Location: Where morons reign supreme	I buy bottled water because I despise the taste of my tapwater. I don't even make tea or oatmeal with it because I can still taste it. I think a brita pitcher sounds like a good investment though. I do recycle all my bottles at least. When I was first in college, my friends and I would bring empty 2 liter bottles "home" when we'd visit our parents houses and bring back tapwater from where we grew up, because it tasted fine there. Salt Lake water is just nasty. __________________ "They say that patriotism is the last refuge to which a scoundrel clings; steal a little and they throw you in jail, steal a lot and they make you king" Formerly Medusa

02-18-2006, 05:29 PM	#11 (permalink)
Borla Junkie	Here is my personal story of the irony of bottled water........ I live in Illinois. It seems that the attraction many bottles water brands key in on is that they are from somewhere else, that is supposed to be cleaner, more pure, or at least "different" from where the consumer is. Different MUST be better, right? Well, I took a trip several years ago to the back woods of Manitoba. A place that seemed incredibly clean, pure, and unpolluted to me. We fished and enjoyed the wild for over a week. The water was so clean we drank it out of the river, and the running water was actually from a hose with a sand filter at the end, no other treatment. One day we drove to the nearest outpost and I happened to see some bottled water. I looked closer, and it was from Illinois!!!! Here the water is from Canada, or France, or some place with glaciers. There, I saw water from Illinois. __________________ Coimhéad fearg fhear na foighde!!!!

02-18-2006, 05:29 PM	#12 (permalink)
Martian Young Crumudgeon Location: Canada	I never understood why people complain about paying $1.00 for a litre of gasoline but will pay $1.50 for half a litre of stuff that comes out of the taps for free. One of the first things I invested in when I moved out on my own was a brita pitcher and even that isn't strictly necessary; the tap water here isn't really all that bad. Coming from my hometown where the water is terrible, it was more habit than anything else. __________________ I wake up in the morning more tired than before I slept I get through cryin' and I'm sadder than before I wept I get through thinkin' now, and the thoughts have left my head I get through speakin' and I can't remember, not a word that I said - Ben Harper, Show Me A Little Shame

02-18-2006, 05:40 PM	#13 (permalink)
Sage hoarding all the big girl panties since 2005 Location: North side	I grew up drinking water straight out of a mountain spring, so I'm very picky about the taste of my water. The tap water here is simply HORRID, so Martel and I buy gallons of water from the grocery store- they take the tap water and use reverse osmosis to get most of the junk out. Tastes fine to me- not quite like the water at my parent's house, but still decent. The only bottled water that I really "like" is DaSani- it just.... tastes the closest to my parent's water. Martel says that's because it's fortified with dirt __________________ Sage knows our mythic history, King Arthur's and Sir Caradoc's She answers hard acrostics, has a pretty taste for paradox She quotes in elegiacs all the crimes of Heliogabalus In conics she can floor peculiarities parabolous -C'hi

02-18-2006, 06:08 PM	#14 (permalink)
Willravel ... a sort of licensed troubleshooter.	Two words: reverse osmosis. Best water I've ever had. The only bottled water I'll drink is Fiji.

02-18-2006, 09:12 PM	#17 (permalink)
Da Munk Crazy	The tap water here is disgusting and highly chlorinated, so I try to avoid drinking it unless it's filtered.

02-18-2006, 09:30 PM	#19 (permalink)
Carno Junkie	A lot of people who buy bottled water from "exotic" locations are usually douchie fuckfaces. __________________ http://how-to-spell-ridiculous.com/

02-18-2006, 09:44 PM	#21 (permalink)
Carno Junkie	I dunno, I've never seen that Fijian stuff before. And I don't think I've ever had someone tell me they drink bottled water because it tastes good. But a lot of people at my school walk around with bottled water because they think it makes them look cool or something. They talk about how the water is made from faery piss or some glacier that's 4564564 million years old and how it's soooo good for you and other stupid shit. Man I hate those people. __________________ http://how-to-spell-ridiculous.com/

02-19-2006, 12:02 AM	#22 (permalink)
yellowchef Addict Location: Shalimar, FL	I drink it out of convience but i dont buy it regularly. my tap water tastes ok... and we have a filter.. or if im feeling extra good Ill lug some jugs to work and fill them from the filtered water there. but yeah Im in culinary school and people have the dumbest reasons for drinking bottled water. I buy bottled water to bake with, mainly bread because of the chlorine used in tap water so it doesnt fuck up my baking.... but otherwise Id drink water from a hose... and i have I dont like dasani, it tastes like dirt. So does Evian. __________________ the voices in your head are not real--but they still have some really great ideas. always remeber you can choose your friends, but you can't choose your family. But..you CAN choose the insane asylum where you have them all put away!

02-19-2006, 01:36 AM	#25 (permalink)
Sweetpea Fade out Location: in love	i have a brita water filter because we do have some particulates in our tap water here at home bottled water is a crock in my opinion sweetpea __________________ Having a Pet Will Change Your Life! Looking for a great pet?! Click Here! "I am the Type of Person Who Can Get Away With A lot, Simply Because I Don't Ask Permission for the Privilege of Being Myself"

02-19-2006, 01:51 AM	#26 (permalink)
moot1337 Insane Location: Learning to Fly...	Bottled water is silly most of the time... unless it's purified by reverse osmosis or just straight distillation, it's just the same water that comes out of your tap (usually). Have you seen the ads for this new Penta water stuff? They claim to have altered the molecular structure of H2O to make it more hydrating... well, not that you wouldn't have guessed this, but Penta water is exactly the same as any other filtered water... its molecular structure is unchanged, and there are even the exact same amount of H30+ and OH- ions floating around in it, making it the same substance inside every other bottle of bullcrap sold out there. Chlorine is a serious chemical though, which is why I usually let water from my tap sit in an open container for a while before giving it to any of my plants, or myself. Nalgene bottles really are wonderful things, ya dig? To expand upon the DuPont thing: the C-8 contamination is actually so widespread and has been going on for so long that it can be found in the blood of nearly every American - not just those in the high contamination areas. It's a chemical used in the manufacture of teflon, or, more specifically, the binding of teflon to metal, and isn't present in the final product... yet, somehow, it's found its way into groundwater and air just about everywhere, and eventually into our bloodstreams. The good news is that it's not incredibly harmful - the trace amounts we have in our bloodstreams probably won't do much, with regard to birth defects, new diseases, and the like. Flourinated compounds are relatively stable because of how tightly flourine holds onto molecular bonds, but this does mean that its rate of degradation in the environment is VERY slow. Chlorinated compounds are much, much more toxic, as chlorine ionizes pretty easily, and can do some wonky shit to organisms - there's a reason why the French use Ozone, rather than chlorine, to purify their water. The thing I find disturbing, though, is that DuPont continues to release this substance into air and water, as they have for more than 3 decades. They know that in large quantities, c-8 is harmful to human development, and they even know how to manufacture teflon without this chemical, but, because of the profit involved, they simply carry on. I've moved away from teflon products not because they're a particular health risk (though they do outgas above 300F) but because of that company's work ethic, which is one of lies, deceit, and greed. I encourage everyone to try out hard-anodized aluminum instead of teflon when you can, as it's much more durable and (usually) doesn't benefit such an underhanded company. __________________ And that, my liege, is how we know the Earth to be banana-shaped. This new learning amazes me, Sir Bedevere. Explain again how sheeps' bladders may be employed to prevent earthquakes. Oh, certainly, sir.

02-19-2006, 03:02 AM	#27 (permalink)
aKula Psycho	In Germany everyone drinks bottled water. But they have a sane system there where the water is bought in glass bottles. You return these glass bottles (which are re-used) and obtain a large discount on your next purchase (it is even cheaper in Italy). Here in Australia they don't have such a system but we still buy bottled water. Firstly it's carbonated, something I am used to and makes it more enjoyable to drink. Then there is no chlorine or fluoride in the water, the first of which tastes bad, the second of which is bad for you. My doctor recently said that I should not drink any tap water as it could be the cause of eczema on my hands. In conclusion bottled water is not a bad thing if there is a system in place whereby glass bottles are returned and re-used. It makes it better for the consumer, the producer and the environment. __________________ "I am the wrath of God. The earth I pass will see me and tremble." -Klaus Kinski as Don Lope de Aguirre

02-19-2006, 03:57 AM	#28 (permalink)
analog Banned	The US, and many other governments, regulates the quality (safety) of tap water. If you're on a well, it may or may not be regulated properly. I don't care what is said about tap water vs. bottle water... some tap water tastes like absolute shit (and some bottled water, too), and I could care less if it's "safe". Safe is good- but if it tastes terrible where you are, then it tastes terrible. At least in the US, bottled water still has to pass minimal safety testing. So really it comes down to taste. Depending on where I am (and I love drinking water), i either enjoy it from the tap or find it horrid-tasting. That's just a personal preference. And poke fun at Evian all you want... I don't care what they claim, I don't care if it's really the purest water on the planet (or not)- it tastes good to me, and I will buy it however often I feel like it. I have to have good water, though... I have a really good purifier hooked up to the tap. I fill 2-liter bottles (not old soda ones, they're a different shape), one at a time, and keep them both in the refrigerator. I rotate two, so while i'm using one, the other is sitting in the back for a few days, and the water tastes that much better. Last edited by analog; 02-19-2006 at 04:01 AM..

02-19-2006, 01:32 PM	#32 (permalink)
Wyckd Crazy Location: Los Angeles, CA	i live in los angeles, and the tap water here TASTES horrible... and not only in my home.. but every restaurant i go to in or outside of Los Angeles, when they serve water. its tap water.. and i can totally taste the funkiness of it.. bottled water tastes clean... some cleaner and more refreshing than others.. but generally doesnt have the tap water taste.

02-20-2006, 11:29 AM	#33 (permalink)
billege Watcher Location: Ohio	I wanted to comment on this one, though most good points have already been made. I think that a lot of people commonly forget that money is a system of valuation, not just made up numbers applied to products. Money is a great concept that enables me to say “society thinks my 8 hours at my desk today is worth $X” and also “the resources spent in making this shirt, or bottle of water, are worth this.” Given that system of valuation, it’s easy to tell if how much effort went into whatever it is you’re buying. That’s what money does for us. My point segues to the article’s mention of how many gallons of oil is used in the bottled water industry. That’s some false logic thrown out to insinuate that bottled water is some kind of great oil waster. Well, the thing is that every product (just about) has some energy consumed to make it. I can’t imagine one that doesn’t. Does it take the burning of oil to get my bottle of water to my desk? Of course it does. But the thinking can’t stop there. It also took burring of oil to get the Twinkie to my desk; but, no one’s going to vilify Twinkies by compiling a statement like “Twinkies are responsible for the use of XX gallons of oil!” Because that’s true for just about every consumer product there is. Think about this product: Dirt. That’s right, Dirt. Bagged dirt. Lowe’s and Home Depot have tons of dirt in bags. I can go buy dirt, because it’s better than the dirt I already have. At some point that bagged dirt was not in bags. A bulldozer, that likely runs on diesel, scooped up the dirt and took it to a dump truck. The dump truck burned some more fuel taking the dirt to a machine that surely runs on electricity, or I guess, more oil. Either way, something used energy to get the dirt into bags. Then someone put the bags on a pallet, that a forklift burned more petrochemicals to move to a truck. The semi burned more oil to bring the dirt to a store, where I bought it under lights lit by other fossil fuels (I live in OH, 90% of our generation is coal), off a cash register that runs on electricity. Then I put the dirt in my car, which burned MORE petrochemicals to get it home. Then I put the dirt on top of the dirt I already had. Now how does one sum up the value for all of those resources expended? With money, that’s how. I paid $x for the bag of dirt, and that summed the value of every bit of energy expended in getting that dirt to me. If someone with a lot of spare time wanted to, they could figure out that X% of the $Y spent was for the cost of transport, IE fuel costs. In fact, a dedicated individual could figure out how much oil was used from start to finish, and go on the warpath against the frivolous use of oil for moving dirt. My point is that it takes oil to get a Twinkie on your desk, a bag of dirt on your garden, a hotdog at the game, or that bottle of water in your hand. The value of everything that went into that water is contained in the cost charged for it. The bottle of water in my hand costs $0.25 (a 20 pack for $5). Some percentage of the 25 cents went for the cost of oil. Though the aggregate might sound impressive, but it’s not really at all. __________________ I can sum up the clash of religion in one sentence: "My Invisible Friend is better than your Invisible Friend."

02-20-2006, 12:49 PM	#34 (permalink)
kutulu Junkie	I don't buy much bottled water but I don't drink tap water. The tap water in the Phoenix area tastes like ass. It's horrible. I get my water from the water store. I use a 5 gallon bottle and it's between 0.25-0.35/gallon depending on what place I go to. Since I don't clean the crock and bottle as much as I should, it's probably not as healthy as tap water but we aren't getting sick from it and it tastes great. The water stores use RO, de-ionization, UV filtering, charcoal filtering, and a couple other methods. It gets rid of all the bad tastes that are in our tap water. I've tried Brita filters, they are useless. I don't notice any taste change.

02-20-2006, 05:22 PM	#36 (permalink)
splck it's jam Location: Lowerainland BC	I'll buy bottled water if I'm away from home, but while home it's the tap for me. Bottled water is a supreme wast of money. __________________ nice line eh?

02-20-2006, 05:35 PM	#37 (permalink)
msh58 Crazy	i drink nothing but tap water and yeah i guess it shows

02-20-2006, 06:01 PM	#38 (permalink)
AngelicVampire Insane	Out of curiosity what is reverse osmosis? Osmosis is "The diffusion of water across a semi-permeable membrane along a concentration gradient" (yay 4th-5th year Biology... I wrote that so many times) so what does the reverse bit do? Googling it seems to turn up Osmosis results (How Stuff Works). Edit- Found it, reverse osmosis takes salt/other water and reverses the osmosis process... basically rather than taking nice clean water and filtering it we waste a lot of power/time cleaning dirty water, thus polluting more of our nice clean water... odd concept but if it pays! In Britain our tap water is pretty nice, even through the lead pipes in my house (not been replaced since 1902 when the house was built!). Bottled water always seems a little like a con, it does seems safer than what comes out of some of my taps (its often slightly brown but perfectly healthy) but the cost is stupidly high... and isn't the only cost/pollution efficient recycling (other than bio matter) aluminium? Last edited by AngelicVampire; 02-20-2006 at 06:04 PM..

02-20-2006, 06:25 PM	#39 (permalink)
Nimetic Junkie Location: Melbourne, Australia	Just a quick question - what does letting the water sit do? Does this allow the chlorine a bit of time to bind with organic stuff in the water or something? Do you have any idea where in the water supply "process" chlorine is added?

02-20-2006, 07:14 PM	#40 (permalink)
splck it's jam Location: Lowerainland BC	Letting water sit in an open container allows the chlorine to dissipate. You'll notice a big difference. Chloramine (chlorine and ammonia) treated water takes much longer to dissipate. The chlorine or chloramine is added in secret little buildings somewhere between your tap and the well or reservoir. __________________ nice line eh? Last edited by splck; 02-20-2006 at 07:17 PM..