Is Bottled Water Just a Waste?

[snopes]

Walk into any grocery store in the country and they rise up like the eighth wonder of the world -- bottles upon bottles of water, all begging to be bought.

But when the free water coming out of most American taps is perfectly drinkable, some wonder why people are paying for water bottled in places as far off as Fiji.

http://www.abcnews.go.com/GMA/Business/story?id=3323614

[Lady Neeva]

Because some tap water is just plain disgusting. Honestly it is. Last place I lived, you had a better than 50% chance of getting a cool refreshing glass of cockroach. I think the record was 5 roaches in a single glass once.

Or theres an area just south-east of me that has a water treatment tank that's gone bad. They're cleaning it now, but until it IS clean the entire area smells like rotten eggs and/or decomposing bodies (depending which news station you watch lol). I can only imagine what the tap water tastes like there, because water picks up funky smells/tastes from the air REALLY easily.

Then there are the mild annoyances... some people hate hard water for example. I hate soft water. I won't buy water if I'm stuck somewhere with soft water (I'll just make kool-aid out of it lol), but in the cockroach apartment... yeah I'd buy water from time to time.

[greenfrog78]

I am spoiled on distilled water. I won't drink water with any kind of smell to it, ick. I don't even like bottled "spring" water (like a spring in the middle of the parking lot). Now I also like the water that is treated by reverse osmosis and ultraviolet light, I can't tell it from distilled. We have a water distiller we use. I don't drink a lot of bottled water but I re-fill water bottles with home distilled, so every once in a while I'll pick up a bottle of Aquafina or Ice Mountain mostly for the size bottle I like.

[mela681]

Our tap water is disgusting to bottled water is a must. I would rather buy water than have my kids drink soda because the tap water was nasty.

[Morrigan]

I love our tap water, but when at work, it's city water and tastes nasty, so bottled water it is.

The only bottled water that tastes half-way decent to me is Dasani, though. Any of the others have nasty under-tones.

Morrigan

[Pseudo_Croat]

Bottled water has its purposes - when you're travelling to a foreign land (or even a nearby city with not-so-tasty tap water - I, for one, personally can't stand the water in Orlando), for natural disasters, or during sporting events. However, any other time, it's good ol' tap for me.

- Pseudo (my city's water is some of the sweetest around) Croat

[zabia]

Originally Posted by Lady Neeva

Last place I lived, you had a better than 50% chance of getting a cool refreshing glass of cockroach.

(emotions while reading.) , gotta remember that phrase

I think the record was 5 roaches in a single glass once.

EW EWW EWWWWWW. I thought that was a joke. ewwww.

[Diehard]

I have Wilsons Disease (Hereditary Liver Disease) and I must have water that is purified or bottled water, when I am home I use our refrigerator that has a filtration system and ice maker on it. But when I am somewhere I must have bottled water so I keep a case in the car at all times, I have to watch the copper and minerals in the water for my liver and kidneys.

[imjustasteph]

Before we moved next door to my in-laws (read: last time we had city water) I was in the habit of buying bottled water- store brand (Sam's Choice, to be specific) and freezing it. On a hot day, I'd run hot water just over the top part of the bottle, melt just the top bit, and then take it outside with me. All day long, there'd be a sip or two of ice cold water there ready for me. If there wasn't enough, I'd take the bottle in and fill the empty space with tap water.

BUT we also saved the bottles (most of them- DH did throw away ones he took to work, and every now and then I'd throw one out) and refilled them with tap water, then did the same thing with the tap water bottles.

When we moved, we had well water, which my FIL (aka next-door neighbor, aka landlord) swore was delicious. Wouldn't know, since the pipes were all installed wrong and coated in rust and grime, making what came out of the tap undrinkable. We started buying jugs of water for making the baby's bottles, and buying more bottled water, since we weren't refilling.

Now that we've moved from there, we have tap water once again, and OHHH it is so good to drink water without doing a quick count of bottles to see how you're affecting the supply and if you'll have to go to the store tomorrow......


ETA: Meant to say, we have CITY water again.

[Andrew of Ware]

I once read an American guide book to London and it said that the tap water is safe to drink - and it tastes good as well. This really surprised me, but reading many of the posts above I can believe it now. I quite like tap water I get (I live just outside London), but it is very hard. Where my dad lives they get beautiful soft tap water from Wales.

[Jay Tea]

I use local spring water from an ancient aquifer, Thames Water unfortunately do a nice line in chlorinated, ultra-hard tap water which ain't so good. Should change soon, as we get hooked up to the Gatehampton pipeline, which is splendid lower chalk aquifer water and one of the largest groundwater pumping systems in operation.

[jw]

I thought I posted here before, but the water gremlins must have swallowed it.

Some places get 300+ days of sunshine per year, whereas we get 300+ days of at least some rain, so it's no surprise that the tap water which comes from the nearby Wicklow hills is soft and drinkable.
However, bottled water sells well here too. My DD buys a 250ML bottle every day. Go Figure.

My friend who lives in Carcassone in the south of France close to the Pyrenees, travels the short distance to Alet les Bains, a spa town famed for its water springs.
He brings hundreds of bottles. He only rinses them in the waste spring water and fills from the free spring taps which proliferate the town. I suppose on reading this thread, he should really sterilise first?

[lynnejanet]

I've posted this before, but I got giardia (beaver fever) from our city water many years ago, and ever since I've been very leery of tap water from my hometown. I had started to drink some (in coffee and such) but now there's been a scare about lead levels in Ontario water, and we live in an old Victorian house, in the old part of town. THe pipes in the house aren't lead, but the line coming in from the water main is, so it's bottled for us, exclusively.

The frustrating thing is that my husband bought a reverse osmosis system last summer, but hasn't installed it yet. Grrr.

[Missie]

I hate the tap water where I live. I'm not sure what exactly is in it, but there's something in it that I'm apparently very sensitive to, because if I drink a glass of tap water I get a splitting headache.

Thus, I buy distilled. Not regular bottled water, they add minerals "for taste" and some of them I'm still sensitive to (particularly whatever's in Aquafina and Evian, blech). I buy the cheap-ass gallon jugs of distilled water that have nothing in them but water.

In Norway, I can drink the tap water. I don't think they put fluoride in the area that I'm in, so maybe that's what I'm most sensitive to back home. I'm also not sure if it's chlorinated (I'm way out in a rural area right now), but whatever they do to it, it's much, much better than the water back home. I also notice that their bottled water tastes a bit better than some of the bottled water back home as well. There's a particular brand here (Olden, I think, and possibly Imsdal(e?)) that they say is made from melted icebergs or something. I have no idea if that's true or not, but it tastes great.

Anyway, I'm rambling. I buy bottled distilled water because I'm sensitive to something in the tap water back home, is my point.

[Not_Done_Living]

Yesterday my lady and I purchased a bottle of water named " O2".

It is advertised as having EXTRA Oxygen Molecules to make it much more healthier.. so instead of being H2O, it is H2O2.. which is also commonly known as Hydrogen Peroxide.

which it isn't.. at least.. it doesn't TASTE like Hydrogen Peroxide.

[Mrs. Matthews]

My tap water here is horrible. Some times I will drink a sip of it just for taking pills or something, but even just a sip makes me shutter.

I really like the taste of Dasani the best out of all the bottled water, but I have heard that Dasani just purifies the local tap water of whatever area the plant is in. So I wonder if Dasani tastes different in different parts of the country, or if it is the "minerals" they add that make up the taste?

[quiltsbypam]

I've been buying bottled water since the quiltlet was a few months old. We have a chemical in our water that I can't pronounce or spell (CIS123 something something something). The water supply is tested extensively and they always announced that the chemical level was safe. But the "safety" is only for adults. Nobody knew what was safe for children. So I buy water every week. The level is much lower now, but I rather like the water we buy and it's less than $1 per gallon.

The upside to that is we could discontinue the quiltlet's fluoride drops, because I buy fluoridated water for her.

[Le Chevalier Blanc]

Originally Posted by Not_Done_Living

It is advertised as having EXTRA Oxygen Molecules to make it much more healthier.. so instead of being H2O, it is H2O2

Actually, to move from H2O to H2O2, you add an oxygen atom. An oxygen molecule would be O2 unto itself. One could certainly add additional oxygen molecules to water - just like carbonation is adding CO2 to a liquid.

While I'm not saying this makes it more healthy, it certainly doesn't turn the beverage into hydrogen peroxide.

[Errata]

Our water here is rather hard. It actually tastes ok, better than a lot of places I've tried, but it can leave deposits when cleaning, and its not quite as refreshing as softer bottled water. I go through a lot of bottled water, but if its not available and I have to drink tap water, its acceptable. I know I could get a filtration system and water softener, but the cheap ones still don't result in bottled water quality, and the more expensive ones require a lot of maintenance and its not clear how much cheaper or easier it would be than bottled water.

[OptimusShr]

We buy spring water here. That suff is great. I only buy a bottle to keep in the fridge whenever I want a drink. The water that comes with the bottle never seems to quench my thirst though. I could drink the entire bottle and still have be thirsty five minutes later.