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Microplastics found in 93% of bottled water tested in global study

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Re: Microplastics found in 93% of bottled water tested in global study

#61

Post by kartan »

Retric wrote: post #20
djsumdog wrote: post #4

Bottled water is a scam. It's less regulated than municipal tap water in most developed nations, companies suck up water from small towns and use tons of fuel to ship it out of those watersheds and then charge people 1000% markup. For countries without clean water, the effort should be put into getting municipal water supplies. Don't buy plastic disposable water bottles if you live in a developed nation. They prop up…

25% of US municipal drinking water fails Safety standards: https://www.popsci.com/drinking-water-standards Those standards are also very loose IMO letting a lot of crap though that I don't want to drink on a regular basis. So, it's really more of a mixed bag than you might think.

> Don't buy plastic disposable water bottles if you live in a developed nation

I´m playing with semantics here. But some parts of USA hardly count as developed states. As a country, the USA is overachieving in a lot of measures, but individual states found themselves at the same level than developing nations.

It´s difficult to apply the same rule to 10,000,000km2 of territory and 325 Million people.

Re: Microplastics found in 93% of bottled water tested in global study

#62

Post by TomMarius »

giltron wrote: post #54
Retric wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

25% of US municipal drinking water fails Safety standards: https://www.popsci.com/drinking-water-standards Those standards are also very loose IMO letting a lot of crap though that I don't want to drink on a regular basis. So, it's really more of a mixed bag than you might think.

All the more reason to push for our governments to properly regulate a safe supply of drinking water (infrastructure level).

Governments that do this in Europe fail horribly and just increase prices by huge multiples, nothing else. Last year a whole division of a capital city (Prague) got pretty seriously sick because of government failure. Today in the morning the water did not run at all. Thanks, government.

I know HN is very leftist, so I expect downvotes. It'd be nice to have a discussion though.

Re: Microplastics found in 93% of bottled water tested in global study

#63

Post by vim_wannabe »

jwilk wrote: post #53
wollstonecraft wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What if you want to avoid fluoride?

Out of interest, why?

Probably the same reason why people may want to avoid lead, mercury in tuna or microplastics: Science is always trying to figure out the safe levels of consumption. Especially for something consumed your entire life starting as a fetus.

Re: Microplastics found in 93% of bottled water tested in global study

#64

Post by Retric »

opencl wrote: post #52
Retric wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

25% of US municipal drinking water fails Safety standards: https://www.popsci.com/drinking-water-standards Those standards are also very loose IMO letting a lot of crap though that I don't want to drink on a regular basis. So, it's really more of a mixed bag than you might think.

If you live in one of those areas you're far better off with a filtration system than regularly purchasing bottled water which is also not in any way guaranteed to be safe.

It can take a lot to filter water safely. The classic carbon filter under the sink does very little to improve safety, even reverse osmosis can fall short. So, while you can make things safer it's far more difficult than many assume.

Re: Microplastics found in 93% of bottled water tested in global study

#65

Post by ricardobeat »

ttsda wrote: post #24

Keep in mind they only tested 11 brands from 9 countries.

“Only” 250 bottles from 11 brands and 9 countries from different continents. I think this is more than anyone could ask for for an initial study, usually it would be done for a single region.

Re: Microplastics found in 93% of bottled water tested in global study

#66

Post by Falling3 »

therein wrote: post #58
dsfyu404ed wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Especially considering that the oil filter in your car is good to tens of microns for tens of thousands of gallons and costs ~$5. You'd think that if you're running an industrial plant (at a scale where multi-stage filters, centrifugal separation, etc, etc are economically viable) you'd be able to do a heck of a lot better than 10 100 micron particles per liter.

To be fair, I think these microplastics accumulate in the water after they have been bottled.

I didn't think it had anything to do with plastic from the bottles the water is sold in. Where is that assumption coming from?

Re: Microplastics found in 93% of bottled water tested in global study

#67

Post by alfanick »

vatys wrote: post #33
awareBrah wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

what do you suggest for people who cannot tolerate the taste of some tap water. The one in my area taste very metallic and makes tea/coffee brewed with it have an unpleasant flavor. I bought a brita-like water filter with great reviews on amazon, but despite that, some of the metallic flavor remains. My old home had a reverse osmosis system which tasted amazing, but I'm not going to invest in a super expensive water…

You can get a reverse osmosis system for ~$150. Maybe not cheap, but not super expensive either. Even if you're renting for a year and leave it behind that's less then $0.50 a day over one year.

Which leaves you with classical-clean-US-water - no taste, nothing. Doesn't taste good, doesn't taste bad, it's just not there.

Re: Microplastics found in 93% of bottled water tested in global study

#69

Post by ash_gti »

TomMarius wrote: post #62
giltron wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All the more reason to push for our governments to properly regulate a safe supply of drinking water (infrastructure level).

Governments that do this in Europe fail horribly and just increase prices by huge multiples, nothing else. Last year a whole division of a capital city (Prague) got pretty seriously sick because of government failure. Today in the morning the water did not run at all. Thanks, government. I know HN is very leftist, so I expect downvotes. It'd be nice to have a discussion though.

Citations? I don't know much about European handling of drinking water.

Re: Microplastics found in 93% of bottled water tested in global study

#70

Post by marcosdumay »

foobaw wrote: post #21
djsumdog wrote: post #4

Bottled water is a scam. It's less regulated than municipal tap water in most developed nations, companies suck up water from small towns and use tons of fuel to ship it out of those watersheds and then charge people 1000% markup. For countries without clean water, the effort should be put into getting municipal water supplies. Don't buy plastic disposable water bottles if you live in a developed nation. They prop up…

When I visited India, the locals recommended me to always drink bottled water or else I'd get really sick. Maybe in the US, it can be solved on a city-by-city basis. For some other countries, I think it's a much more complex problem.

How much is it because of reality and how much is because pf propaganda?

People on Brazil will always tell you to drink bottled water too, yet all the safety issues that make into news (always a very small note at the end of the news) are with bottled water and the sanitary standards are much more strict with tap water.

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