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One more reason not to use tap water!

Just to be contrarian, though: the U.S. has a pretty good record for tapwater, yet companies selling bottled water at a 10,000% markup or so from tapwater have really convinced a lot of people that bottled water is "better." I heard an interview with a dentist who believed that because so many people are not drinking tap water with flouride, and that is leading to an increased incidence of tooth decay. Also, bottled water is not regulated, so it's got all sorts of "junk" in it, too-- in fact, at least one of the bottled water companies have found that people's perception of "pure" water taste is based on the taste of the local tapwater, so they deliberately add stuff to the local bottled water to make it taste like the local tapwater. Certainly, for aquarium use RO/DI water is a good choice, but for human consumption, I'm there seem to be good arguments that tapwater does offer some advantages (and bottled water seems to be the worst of both worlds.)

I heard the author of this article on NPR and was convinced that bottled water is an exploitative rip-off that's bad for the environment and the economy... and anyway, "evian" is "naive" spelled backwards.
 
It also depends on the local aquifer...out here in the land of alkaline deposits, tap water tastes like...well...well. You know.
We also have had two instances of contamination in local tap sources involving fecal matter and even heavy metals.

Now, back in Minnesota, we had our own well...and that water was fantastic. Guess you do need to check your local water quality.

We have a service, for 40 bucks a month, they deliver as much RO as you can use.
 
true that, guys. obviously these chemicals are measured in parts per billion or trillion so it does not seem to pose an immediate and sudden "new" threat to anyone (like fecal contamination, yuck.) but it's more in terms of the chronic low-level exposure presented to major metropolitan areas. Clearly there are more immediate reasons to RO/DI all aquarium water, but a few more drugs thrown into the mix certainly doesnt help matters for anyone involved.

Bottled (for human consumption) water is totally a scam.

that stuff about endocrine inhibitors is pretty disconcerting as well. yikes.
 
ok, sorry for the off topic post here but Mike mentioning RO/DI water brought up a question, my grocery store sells RO OR DI water. When you guys say RO/DI water do you mean "one or the other" or literally RO/DI? If, by RO/DI water you do mean "one or the other", which one is better?

By the way, I have heard of this before and I also have heard that someone from the University of Oregon, I believe, has been doing testing of the sewage systems of some cities to find out things such as how much drug intake certain cities had, the results were surprising with some tests showing 50% more drug abuse than surveys show!!!!
 
RO/DI would typically mean the water was processed by both methods. It is common and a very good idea to have your own RO/DI unit producing this water source at home. With some automation, it can directly feed to a top of reservoir or your tank, so you wont have to worry about evaporation.
 
As I understand it, RO, or reverse osmosis (the process that the article says will remove drugs) is a process that forces water though a very fine membrane (the carbon and poly prefilters are there to remove larger particles and preserve the live of the RO membrane). The DI, deionization process (often incorrectly assumed to be distilled water) forces water over a sand type filter to remove minerals and metals (in our case copper being the most important). When I first bought my RO/DI unit, DI water was not supposed to be potable (and some DI sands will add dissolved solids to the RO water) but I think the FDA has change this decision or I have been misimformed.

Some of the bottled water will say it have been through the RO process. The water that tastes best usually has minerals added.

If you read the labels and don't just buy tap water (many of the bottled water people tell you you can acquire the source info by writing them but don't publish it for the masses - tap water I assume) there is a convenience factor (and bottling cost) that the nay sayers overlook (but the industry thrives). The success of the bottled water business also suggests that we are drinking more water and less coffee and soda but still want the convenience of the personal, disposable container. And as an aside, I asked my dentist about floride in the water (since the Britta type filters remove it with the chlorine) and his feeling was that brushing with a good floride tooth paste out-weighed the benefit from what was present in the water. On the other hand, my oldest son was not good about brushing his teeth as a tike but I don't know that he has ever had a cavity (definitely not in his baby teeth) and he is now 29 while I had cavities quite young until early adult. I stopped having decay problems at a time that would coinside with both toothpaste and water changes.
 
I tested the TDS of my tap for hell of it, 47 ppm...not bad at all. I tested poland spring bottle, 149. Of course that can be all the harmless minerals too that help give water some "taste". But for my octo tank I wouldnt think of using anything besides RO/DI
 
I would expect poland spring to have high TDS. It comes from a spring here in maine, that they don't pay any natural resource taxes on, and the water is pretty hard up here.
 

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