bottled water

[hotcommodity]

I was listening to a radio show a few weeks ago, and they had a guest by the name of Sydney Ross Singer, who is a "medical anthropologist." He discussed many things about humanities current culture that could be making people sick. He mostly discussed how women's braziers have been linked to breast cancer, which I found interesting. But he mentioned something in passing about bottled water, which is that plastic bottles contribute hazardous materials ("carcinogens" was the word he used I believe). He said that he called the FDA, and they told him that the plastic is actually consdiered a food additive. This is his site: selfstudycenter.org.

 

Then a few days ago, the same show had a guest talking about bottled water specifically. He's an investigative reporter by the name of Randall Fitzgerald, and this is his site: http://hundredyearlie.com. He had quite a bit to say about bottled water, so I wont list everything he said, but he stated that the chemicals that are used to make the plastic bottle flexible, migrate into the water, usually at room temperature. I'm curious what your scientific opinions may be on this matter, or even your speculation. I drink alot of bottled water, so if this is true, I'm curious if theres any way to purify the water. For instance, if I boil the water before I drink it, will that get rid of any hazardous chemicals that may be in the water?

[Sayonara]

Read this, it answers pretty much all your questions:

http://www.jhsph.edu/publichealthnews/articles/halden_dioxins.html

 

You have to read it all, because it starts off dismissing dioxins in bottled water, but it's not the dioxins that you are talking about - it's phthalates, which come into it about halfway through.

[hotcommodity]

Read this, it answers pretty much all your questions:

http://www.jhsph.edu/publichealthnews/articles/halden_dioxins.html

 

You have to read it all, because it starts off dismissing dioxins in bottled water, but it's not the dioxins that you are talking about - it's phthalates, which come into it about halfway through.

 

Thanks for the article, thats a little more comforting. The guest I spoke of also mentioned that glacier water is the best because its not distilled or messed with in any fashion by the bottling companies. So I suppose the combination buying glacier water and keeping it stored in a cool place will limit my intake of the phthalates and other unwanted additives. I'm still curious if boiling the water would get rid of any phthalates already in the water...

[ecoli]

What concerns me more then keeping water in plastic is keeping vegetable oil in plastic.

 

They are both non-polar, right? So isn't the plastic dissolving into the oil?

[Sayonara]

Phthalates are highly soluble in oil, yes.

[Sisyphus]

is the best because its not distilled or messed with in any fashion by the bottling companies.

 

Wouldn't distilled water be the purest possible?

[bascule]

Here's the real problem with bottled water:

 

Tap water:

- Moved by: Pipes

- Power source: Gravity

- End cost: Cheap

 

Bottled water:

- Moved by: Trains, Boats, Trucks, etc.

- Power source: Hydrocarbons

- End cost: Expensive with substantially higher collateral CO₂ emissions

[ecoli]

Here's the real problem with bottled water:

 

Tap water:

- Moved by: Pipes

- Power source: Gravity

- End cost: Cheap

Unless of course the tap water comes from a poisoned source... then the result is death (or simple illness). Obviously, bottled water is preferable in this situation.

 

How many people that buy bottled water have access to clean, pollutant-free water? And, is the bottled water any better, anyway.

[Sayonara]

The more I read about phthalates, the more I find the sources contradict each other

[hotcommodity]

Wouldn't distilled water be the purest possible?

 

Well I've been reading about it a little more, and from what I see, distilled water appears to be the purest. I read one case where someone had gotten sick from glacier water because the water contained "black plant material." If I recall correctly,the distilling process involves vaporizing the water to separate it from heavier materials, and of course the water has to be boiled in the process, so common sense would tell me that the process would also kill off any bacteria in the water.

[1veedo]

Distilled means there's nothing in the water. It doesn't even conduct electricity.

[NeonBlack]

Even the purest water you can get will still conduct electricity, although it has a very high resistance, 18.2 million ohm-meters if my memory is correct.

[Pre4edgc]

Well, I remember in elementary school doing a project like this. I think it ended with distilled being the purest, then rainwater, then tap, and then anything on the ground. I think the bottled comes between the rainwater and the tap water. I can't really remember that much though, so I might be a little off...

[Dak]

he stated that the chemicals that are used to make the plastic bottle flexible, migrate into the water, usually at room temperature.

 

as the end of sayo's article pretty much said, statements like this mean pretty little without some kind of quantification (how much of the chemicals leach out?).

 

arsenic is a by-product of copper production. if you drink water that's deliverd through copper pipes, you'll be drinking water that's 'contaminated' by copper. but it doesn't matter, as theres not too much of it. (complete guess alert) you'd probably get hypohydration (basically water poisoning) before arsenic poisoning if you drunk as much tap water as you could.

[insane_alien]

yeah, the quantity of chemicals that'll leach into the water is basically insignificant.

 

if you want to see just how much stuff is in bottled water, take a litre of it, put in a pot and boil it until its dry. there will be, at most, a very thin film on the bottom of the various minerals the water contains.

 

do the same with tap water, there will be a much more visible film of mineral deposition.

[Sayonara]

arsenic is a by-product of copper production. if you drink water that's deliverd through copper pipes, you'll be drinking water that's 'contaminated' by copper. but it doesn't matter, as theres not too much of it. (complete guess alert) you'd probably get hypohydration (basically water poisoning) before arsenic poisoning if you drunk as much tap water as you could.

 

The thing is though, in the case of fat-soluble chemicals like phthalates you need to take into account their cumulative effect over time.

 

Nobody expects to get a fatal dose from one bottle.