I remember seeing this thing on Dateline that Everest water was bottled from the municipal water supply of my hometown. That's when I started being skeptical of bottled water.

But I think we're kind of caught between a rock and a hard place. When I was in DC I couldn't drink the tap water without being sick, so you buy bottled. But then the plastic from those bottles seeps out chemicals if water is in them too long, and that makes you sick too. It's a lose/lose situation. like that song by Mos Def, "New World Water".

Meep, I've got to say, little scare me more than our water supply. It is being polluted, and water is at the heart of every living thing, it seems. I use a Brita filter...I do'nt know what else to do. I remember walking/hiking through mountains in upstate NY and bending low to drink from springs that ran out of the mountain. There is nothing like it. I despise Pepsico and the others for using that image to sell the hordes fucking tap water. A pox on their products and their ill-gained fortunes. May their cellular fluids turn to Coke.

see... I was thinking about it, and I think that environmental issues are the one thing we as people should stand around because they affect everyone, but the dialogue right now is one of "left-hippies, right-polluters" in this country. There's so much more to it.
I think most large corporations are too focused on making money and pleasing shareholders. But if somehow we were able to convince shareholders of us poisoning ourselves... maybe things would start to change. You have to work within people's view, even if it's limited or different. And then maybe they'll start to see outside that.

wise words, Meep.

I'm officially a water-in-a-jar kind of girl. I mostly use used snapple bottles. I hate buying all that bottled water. As meep pointed out, " the plastic from those bottles seeps out chemicals if water is in them too long, and that makes you sick too." yup. they have even found that plastic in newborn babies because it comes from everywhere. every plastic bottled drink, even shampoo bottles and is transfered to the uterus. even the pastic baby bottles and toys.it reminds me of the teflon coating that chips off into food.

and all those bottles in the landfill!

San Fran outlawed using city money to buy bottled water. they have even outlawed plastic bags. (hurray!--So happy to be going home today)

Nez, I wonder if I brushed by you at some point in Limelight or The Tunnel back in the day? Hehe. But hey you did the right thing with the tap water, NYC drinking water is pretty damn good as these things go, since it does flow directly from the mountains upstate (incidentally here's where it gathers, in my neck of the woods, before hitting the city). I think Brita, or any other carbon filter, is pretty much the best we can do for now; but I think there's a big future in even more effective small-scale water filtration systems, personal and communal; and on a grander scale, systems to convert seawater to drinkable water. These things could become quite crucial if and when the Water Wars begin in 40 or 50 years. Not to get all Mad Max on ya, but hey just sayin...

This is annoying to no end. This story reminds me of Mos Def's "New World Water." It pisses me off that we're actually BUYING WATER! And for them to confirm after all this that it's exactly the same type of water we drink when we turn on the faucet only makes it worse. In my house, we've actually taken to turning on the faucet and putting the water in the fridge, and guess what? It's delicious! Thanks for the post ...

Beware of drinking "wild" water... Amoebic dysentery and Giardia suck. And if any animals (wild or corralled) graze in the nearby area, parasites will flow into the water. I know it's not romantic, but...

thank you for the link and warning, anon. and i know it seems small, but i do mean it when i say i do not allow anonymous commenters. so please make up a name aside from "anon," if you would be so kind as to honor my blogular etiquette. gracias.

Neither bottled water nor tap is always good or always bad. There are many factors to consider like very high chlorine, flouride and alum levels in tap water and plastic contamination, bacteria and toxins in the bottled stuff.
Using any of the pour through filters {Brita, Pur} channeling can occur in the carbon content, and water just passes through untreated.
Two very large filters, usually 20 inches high, consisting of a prefilter of fiber that filters to 1 micron and a SOLID carbon block that filters to 10 microns and removes the volatiles like chlorine and the heavies like lead are what is needed, plumbed directly into your water system.
Universally, the pyramid sales scheme filters are useless.
This field, water storage, management and pumping and filtering is my bread and butter and I have studied it for decades. I do think we ought to get away from the bottled water for plastic waste reasons and to reduce transport costs. Yet it would be wrong to readily believe your tap water is just great. The odds are it isn't. These days, even the rain water is questionable.

These days, even the rain water is questionable.

that's the sad part. and yeah, i know the Brita filters aren't magic. i just dont have a better solution right now. the last house we were in, we had a big tank with three big ceramic filter thingies in them, very, very small filters, strained out all kinds of stuff, i felt better about that. we need to get something like that again.

Nez,I believe you may have had a reverse osmosis system, but those systems expel and waste water {the highly concentrated salts part} and have other operational problems. They are good for use on boats to make fresh water from salt water however.
The Brita is best used as directed, don't wait too long to change the cartridge.
Leaving tap water to sit overnight removes most of the chlorine as it is in gas form and it evaporates readily. Also good to let the water you use on your plants dechlorinate. Plants HATE chlorine. I am not sure how fluoride is removed by carbon, but it does remove it, mostly. Here in PR the public water is not fluoridated, but there is a dangerous amount of alum in the water because almost all of our water comes from turbulent sources and they use the alum to settle the cloudiness before sending us the water. I have removed a clear gel 1/2 of an inch thick from inside the giant filters I install, on the fiber 1 micron side. That gel is the alum, and it generally arrives all at once because the water treatment plant used too much by mistake. Want to drink some?
Because of decades of intimate examination on a daily basis of our water systems, going back to NYC in 1973, I avoid ever drinking tap water unless nothing else is available. NYC has very good water stored in hundreds of reservoirs Upstate that it sends all the way to the city, a very incredibly complex and sophisticated, yet extremely vulnerable system. However, the closer that water gets to the taps in the City, the more it picks up toxic contaminants that are endemic to the piping in the City, such as lead and plastic toxins, and that water does have chlorine and also {correct me if I am wrong} fluoride and perhaps some clarifying agents like alum. On the plus side, NYC is said to have excellent tasting water.
Way back in the early seventies people made fun of me because I only drank bottled water, but when I traveled to NYC several years ago, I noticed everyone did. Ha Ha, I have laughed the last laugh.
Nez is not paranoid, he is a serious {sometimes} man.
Water is a complicated topic and worthy of study.
We won't get into the really scary shit here like the use of defoliants sprayed on the plants in the watershed area, but that is a reality here in PR.
Again, I very much avoid drinking the tap water. I know far too much about it.

Damn, vato, you know a lot about el agua. As an ex-public health inspector, I know a little and have even shut down systems and pools because of them not testing up to par, but you really have the deep info, and I very much appreciate the knowledge. And alum is why I stopped using certain deodorants.

Yes, I used to live down the road (literally, if the dam ever broke our house would have floated) from one of the reservoirs (Neversink) that fed NYC. Really beautiful reservoir, I'm going to post some pics soon.

Nez, the EPA has all of the records of every water system in the US and Territories {colonies} on line, both for the water supply, and the sewage treatment and has a record of all "incidents" {screw-ups} or at least the ones they know about. Your system is in there if you want to look. You may be pleasantly surprised to find it is one of the better ones. I don't know, look it up. That is where I get all of the info about the locations where I will have to design systems.
But I know "incidents" occur and the EPA doesn't know because the evidence shows up in my filters, hundreds of them I designed and installed.
So when you read the reports remember they are only the tip of the toxic iceberg.
I do not know it all. I have other people I consult with, one of whom is the retired head of the State of Pennsylvania Public Health Department. He got me up to the level I am at now about 8 years ago. I learned a great deal about how to make water safe from G.
Funny that you too learned about water on the job!
There is always new information. I try to keep up.
Presently I am very involved with the start of a new organic vegetable farm {my own} and I am preoccupied with water quality and soil quality. I live on Vieques so you can readily see why this a great concern. The head of the EPA in charge of the Navy Base toxic clean up lives across the street from my office. He is a very nice individual and I have learned a great deal from him also.
You see, the water and soil research is not at all theoretical with me, it is about survival here. So I study very seriously.
I am very happy that you are bringing this topic to your readers. It is not a simple one.

The best type of store bought water is distilled (even though it's still in plastic containers).
For one distilled water leaves behind any heavy metals secondly distillation, in this case at least, requires heat and heat for the most part kills most bacteria.
If you can filter that distilled water via one of those Brita filters you're even better off.

Retraction: I may have to think twice about distilled water. After this post peaked my interest in good ol' h2o. I started doing some reading. This is what I found:
"However, as already mentioned, water without minerals can be a health problem. Dr. Zoltan Rona has authored an excellent paper on 'Pure Water' recommending in no uncertain terms against its continued consumption. According to the U.S. EPA, "Distilled water (which is identical to Reverse Osmosis water), being essentially mineral-free, is very aggressive, in that it tends to dissolve substances with which it is in contact. Notably, carbon dioxide from the air is rapidly absorbed, making the water acidic and even more aggressive. Many metals are dissolved by distilled water." Dr Rona adds; "Longevity is associated with the regular consumption of hard water (high in minerals). Disease and early death is more likely to be seen with the long term drinking of distilled water." As Reverse Osmosis produced water is identical in nature to distilled water we can make the same assumptions."

In a nutshell water as close to it is naturally, is best. But considering for the most part that man has polluted water, I wonder if a diet high in those missing minerals would cover it?
Then again plants and animals for the most part don't drink filtered water and they are in all essence, they are what they consume. Once we consume them..well you get my drift.
Damn!