Is your Bottled Water really Safe?
Although you may think that bottled water is a safer option than tap, two new reports show that the store-bought stuff is actually less regulated than the water you get out of your faucet for free. Unlike tap water suppliers, bottled water companies don't have to have their water tested by a certified laboratory, and they aren't required to notify customers within 24 hours if they find elevated levels of contaminants. The FDA does require bottled water companies to test for contaminants and other problems, says Joshua Sharfstein, M.D., the agency's principal deputy commissioner.
Hidden Dangers of Bottled Water
German researchers have found that the longer a bottle of water sits on a store shelf or in a household pantry, the higher the dose of antimony it contains. Amounts of this potentially toxic trace element were measured for 15 brands of Canadian bottled water and 48 European brands. Concentrations reached more than 100 times the average level of antimony in pristine groundwaters (2 parts per trillion).
However, the concentration was even higher after the bottles were left to sit at room temperature for six months. Antimony concentrations in the Canadian bottled waters increased by 19 percent, concentrations in the European brands increased by 90 percent. Most of the water tested was packaged in bottles made of polyethylene terephthalate (PET). Antimony trioxide is used as a catalyst in the manufacture of PET. The different concentrations of antimony in the various brands might have been caused by differing temperatures, water pHs, or exposure to sunlight.
Dr. Mercola:
The 35-year-old U.S. federal
law regulating tap water is so out of date that the water Americans drink can
pose what scientists say are serious health risks, even if it meets all legal
standards. Only 91 contaminants are regulated by the Safe Drinking Water Act,
yet more than 60,000 chemicals are used within the United States. Government
and independent scientists have scrutinized thousands of those chemicals in
recent decades, and identified hundreds associated with a risk of cancer and
other diseases at small concentrations in drinking water. But not one chemical has been added to the list
of those regulated by the Safe Drinking Water Act since 2000. Recent studies
have also found that even some chemicals regulated by that law pose risks at
much smaller concentrations than previously known. However, many of the act’s
standards for those chemicals have not been updated since the 1980’s, and some
remain essentially unchanged since the law was passed in 1974.
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Tastes Really Great! |
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Ecologically Beneficial |
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Negatively Charged Ionized Water |
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Smaller Water Molecule Clusters provide Greater Hydration |
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Healthy Purified Water Anytime |
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Issues with Bottled Water
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22% Synthetic Organic Compounds Test - Failed |
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17% Voluntary Microbiological Purity (HPC)* Guideline - Failed |
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33% Failed Enforced Microbiological Purity (HPC - Heterotrophic-Plate-Count) Guideline - Failed |
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4% Violated Weak Federal Bottled Water Standards |
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20% Contains Industrial Chemicals: Toluene, Xylene or Chemical Used in Manufacturing Plastic such as Phthalate, Adipate or Styrene. |
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Many Over the Counter Water Bottles contain Arsenic or Nitrates and other Inorganic Contaminants |
Australians Ban Bottled Water
| By KRISTEN GELINEAU | 07/ 9/09 12:01 PM |  |
SYDNEY — Residents of a rural Australian town hoping to protect the earth and their wallets have voted to ban the sale of bottled water, the first community in the country _ and possibly the world _ to take such a drastic step in the growing backlash against the industry.
Residents of Bundanoon cheered after their near-unanimous approval of the measure at a town meeting Wednesday. It was the second blow to Australia's beverage industry in one day: Hours earlier, the New South Wales state premier banned all state departments and agencies from buying bottled water, calling it a waste of money and natural resources."I have never seen 350 Australians in the same room all agreeing to something," said Jon Dee, who helped spearhead the "Bundy on Tap" campaign in Bundanoon, a town of 2,500 about 100 miles (160 kilometers) south of Sydney. "It's time for people to realize they're being conned by the bottled water industry."
First popularized in the 1980s as a convenient, healthy alternative to sugary drinks, bottled water today is often criticized as an environmental menace, with bottles cluttering landfills and requiring large amounts of energy to produce and transport.
Over the past few years, at least 60 cities in the United States and a handful of others in Canada and the United Kingdom have agreed to stop spending taxpayer dollars on bottled water, which is often consumed during city meetings, said Deborah Lapidus, organizer of Corporate Accountability International's "Think Outside the Bottle" campaign in the U.S.
But the Boston-based nonprofit corporate watchdog has never heard of a community banning the sale of bottled water, she said.
"I think what this town is doing is taking it one step further and recognizing that there's safe drinking water coming out of our taps," she said.
Bundanoon's battle against the bottle has been brewing for years, ever since a Sydney-based beverage company announced plans to build a water extraction plant in the town. Residents were furious over the prospect of an outsider taking their water, trucking it up to Sydney for processing and then selling it back to them. The town is still fighting the company's proposal in court.
Then in March, Huw Kingston, who owns the town's combination cafe and bike shop, had a thought: If the town was so against hosting a water bottling company, why not ban the end product?
To prevent lost profit in the 10-or-so town businesses that sell bottled water, Kingston suggested they instead sell reusable bottles for about the same price. Residents will be able to fill the bottles for free at public water fountains, or pay a small fee to fill them with filtered water kept in the stores.
The measure will not impose penalties on those who don't comply when it goes into effect in September. Still, all the business owners voluntarily agreed to follow it, recognizing the financial and environmental drawbacks of bottled water, Kingston said.
On Wednesday, 356 people turned up for a vote _ the biggest turnout ever at a town meeting.
Only two people voted no. One said he was worried banning bottled water would encourage people to drink sugary drinks. The other was Geoff Parker, director of the Australasian Bottled Water Institute _ which represents the bottled water industry.
Australians spent 500 million Australian dollars ($390 million) on bottled water in 2008 _ a hefty sum for a country of just under 22 million people.
On Thursday, Parker blasted the ban as unfair, misguided and ineffective.
He said the bottled water industry is a leader in researching ways to minimize bottled beverage impact on the environment. Plus, he said, the ban removes consumer choice.
"To take away someone's right to choose possibly the healthiest option in a shop fridge or a vending machine we think doesn't embrace common sense," he said.
But tap water is just as good as the stuff you find encased in plastic, said campaign organizer Dee, who also serves as director of the Australian environment group Do Something!
"We're hoping it will act as a catalyst to people's memories to remember the days when we did not have bottled water," he said. "What is 'Evian' spelled backwards? 'Naive.'"
Real Cost of Bottled Water
by Jared Blumenfeld & Susan Leal
…Clearly, the popularity of bottled water is the result of huge marketing efforts. The global consumption of bottled water reached 41 billion gallons in 2004, up 57 percent in just five years. Even in areas where tap water is clean and safe to drink, such as in San Francisco, demand for bottled water is increasing -- producing unnecessary garbage and consuming vast quantities of energy. So what is the real cost of bottled water?
More than 1 billion plastic water bottles end up in the California's trash each year, taking up valuable landfill space, leaking toxic additives, such as phthalates, into the groundwater and taking 1,000 years to biodegrade. That means bottled water may be harming our future water supply. At home and in your car, switch to a stainless steel water bottle and use it for the rest of your life…
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Read more about the real bottled water cost |
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