Questions about water

We were told straight up: do not, under any circumstances, give the baby water from the tap.
If it's not safe for a baby, then it’s clearly not good enough for anyone, right?
They basically told us to just go out and buy bottled water for the kid at the grocery store.

Here’s the thing—I’ve tried everything: Brita filtered, bottled, and straight from the faucet,
but tap water has an absolutely different taste in your mouth, especially that weird aftertaste you get
after you swallow. About five years ago, I spent quite a bit of time living in this gorgeous rural spot where we drank pure, natural spring water. When I finally moved back to Chicago and took a sip of
the tap water here, I was honestly shocked.
The water just tasted... off. Unhealthy.

The Mayor can say whatever he wants, but when a woman over by Millennium Park checked the water her family was drinking, they actually found fecal matter in it.
Now, I’m certain there’s way less junk in our water than that,
but the point is, there *is* stuff in there, even if it isn't supposedly "dangerous" to your health.

If I were you, I'd try this: take 10 liters of water and let it evaporate until there's only a tiny bit left, then drink that—I bet your body wouldn't be too happy about it!

Anyway, I don't even know what else to say, man. I'm stumped!

My first neighbor is Željko Dadić, the guy running the Water Chemistry Department of HZJZ, and he hasn't touched tap water in years. I honestly can't tell who's actually crazy here. 🤣

So, I stumbled upon this article the other day claiming that distillation is basically the only way to actually get pure water. Apparently, the device they’re pushing costs a fortune because regular filters just aren't up to the task... Is that true? What kind of setups are you guys running, and do you think it's worth grabbing a much cheaper option for around $167 instead? Also, is chlorine really as scary as some of these articles make it out to be?

So, we finally bit the bullet and decided that drinking straight from the tap is officially a no-go for us. We're looking into getting a more heavy-duty water filtration system to really step things up...
If any of you guys have some hands-on experience with different filters, please let us know what you think!

Honestly, I’ve had nothing but good experiences with Brita filters.
A few years back, I moved from a neighborhood in Chicago just below the outskirts to another spot closer to the river—and man, the water quality was absolutely abysmal. It had this weird taste and color. That was my first time picking up a Brita filtration system.
Nowadays, since I stick to filtered water at home and bottled water at work, I can tell that pretty much any tap water in the city—anywhere, really—has this lingering aftertaste.
That can't be healthy/normal!

lucky you 🙂 i know a thing or two about this... reverse osmosis filters are pretty much the only real way to actually filter water properly. when we say water, we know what we mean... two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen. all those stories about these machines stripping away everything "good" from the water just don't make any sense... i'm sure water at the source is drinkable and mostly fine, but think about it... what could possibly be good about city tap water??? for example, my building in Chicago is from 1955... i'm positive the pipes leading up to my building haven't been touched since then. just imagine what kind of "healthy" ingredients that water is picking up by the time it hits your glass

Feel free to hit me up in my DMs if you have any questions... I actually repair these kinds of water systems for a living...

I honestly just drink straight from the tap. The water in San Diego used to be some of the best municipal water in the entire country, and I’m pretty sure it still holds up just as well today.

Carol Carter5 said:lucky you 🙂 i know a thing or two about this... reverse osmosis filters are pretty much the only real way to actually filter water properly. when we say water, we know what we mean... two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen. all those stories about these machines stripping away everything "good" from the water just don't make any sense... i'm sure water at the source is drinkable and mostly fine, but think about it... what could possibly be good about city tap water??? for example, my building in Chicago is from 1955... i'm positive the pipes leading up to my building haven't been touched since then. just imagine what kind of "healthy" ingredients that water is picking up by the time it hits your glass

Are they pulling out Ca2+ and Mg2+?
Kudos to filtering out pathogens (though, let's be real, chlorination handles most of that in the city supply), but stripping earth alkaline cations out of the water I drink in massive quantities every single day? No thanks. I actually need those.

Unless, of course, those specific ions aren't being removed. 🤷

Kevin Mitchell20 said:unfortunately they're used for water supply too. I know that for a fact since I'm working on a water management project...

A quick glance at a few recent headlines from our national news outlets should be more than enough to make you question the safety of the water coming out of your tap.

USA Today - 'Water in three states contaminated with heavy metals and bacteria.'
Local News: 160,000 tons of hazardous waste are being dumped in landfills right next to municipal water pumping stations.

The New York Times - Due to frequent pipe bursts, the water in a major Midwestern city is bacteriologically unsafe.

Geological Survey: ''All metropolitan water reservoirs are contaminated.''
Findings: Due to toxic runoff, Chicago could soon be without potable water.

Regional News - Residents in the Midwest enjoy the highest quality water, while those in the South and rural plains face the worst.

Regional News - Rising rates of malignant illnesses linked to contaminated water supplies.

The Washington Post - In parts of the South, 100,000 people are consuming water containing toxic levels of arsenic.

Thousands of tons of synthetic fertilizers and pesticides... end up leaching directly into our waterways.
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Why should we feel obligated to get our minerals from tap water when we can easily obtain them from organically grown vegetables?

rustyridge said:So, I stumbled upon this article the other day claiming that distillation is basically the only way to actually get pure water. Apparently, the device they’re pushing costs a fortune because regular filters just aren't up to the task... Is that true? What kind of setups are you guys running, and do you think it's worth grabbing a much cheaper option for around $167 instead? Also, is chlorine really as scary as some of these articles make it out to be?

It certainly is; you can think of it much like how certain pollutants irritate the lining of our blood vessels, creating a rough surface where cholesterol can easily latch on, which eventually leads to significant blockages.

This is a super interesting topic, so I figured I’d jump in and weigh in a little bit. 😉
First off, I need to correct what someone mentioned a few posts back—claiming the water near the coast is hard and the inland water is soft. It’s actually the exact OPPOSITE!!!!! Take Chicago, for example; it has some of the hardest water in the US! You can see it in the massive amount of limescale buildup in water heaters, washing machines, and all sorts of appliances. Even when you're just boiling tea, it's pretty obvious. But honestly, that hardness has zero to do with pollution. The water is naturally hard because of the Sava gravel in the substrate; it was basically like this back in prehistoric times before civilization even existed. If anyone tried to argue that it's harmful, I wouldn't buy it. By that logic, any bottled mineral water would be way worse since it has even more dissolved minerals—meaning if you boiled it, you'd get WAY more scale! That said, I will agree that softer water (like what you find in karst regions) tastes better and definitely helps your appliances last longer...
Now, something else caught my eye: Do those of you who are a bit older (I’m talking at least 30) remember how, even like 15 years ago in America, you could barely find plain bottled water anywhere?! It was all mineral water. Everyone just drank tap water; nobody even thought about running to the store just to grab a bottle! 😉 So, do you really believe that water quality in most of our cities has suddenly tanked since then? 🙄 I don't think so! If anything, it might be the opposite. We all know that following the war and various privatizations, most of the heavy industry collapsed. There are actually fewer polluters now than there were in the 90s, so I'd say the water quality has either improved or stayed the same; it's hard to imagine it getting worse somewhere. Nowadays, buying bottled water has become a total fashion statement, which in my opinion is completely POINTLESS! Some big-shot tycoons and retailers had the bright idea to turn water into a business by slapping on fancy packaging, giving it catchy names, and preaching about how their specific brand is the absolute best! I’m pretty sure a lot of that stuff is actually worse than tap water—or at least right up there with it—especially since it sits in plastic for months, whereas when you turn on the tap, you're getting it practically straight from the source! And if you crunch the numbers on tap vs. bottled, you'll see that a single liter of bottled water can cost thousands of times more!!! So, is it really that much better? 😁I’d also point out that drinking bottled water is terrible for the environment! Sure, we have recycling programs now, but a huge chunk of those bottles still ends up in the trash or littered in nature, which trashes the environment. Plus, the whole process pollutes through the constant transport of all those bottles—burning fuel for massive trucks, using electricity for bottling plants, and so on. From an environmental standpoint, this bottled water "trend" is a total disaster... 👎And let's not even talk about how much money you save if you just stop buying it! 👍
One last thing: people are always going on about how America is one of the rare or even only places where you can drink tap water. That is absolutely NOT TRUE!!!!! I’ve personally traveled through tons of countries and major cities across Europe and the rest of the world, and most of them have perfectly drinkable tap water. In fact, many places (like Vienna, for instance) have top-tier water quality that I’m certain no city in the US can match... 😉

Paul Rodriguez41 said:So, regarding the Nobel corporation and those kinds of gadgets... I actually had a representative come by to run a water survey. I can't quite recall the specific company name, but all these filters operate on the exact same principle involving water electrolysis. Honestly, the woman was completely unprepared—or rather, she just threw out so much jargon at me that my head started spinning. She tries to perform this electrolysis test on a sample, and sure enough, the water turns black. Then, she runs the water through their filter, and lo and behold, nothing happens during the electrolysis. Well, of course nothing happens, because she’s essentially producing demineralized water that doesn't conduct electricity anymore. If the water tastes flat and lifeless, it's because it is. And then, as if that wasn't enough, the grand finale was her offering me an add-on to buy a component that "improves" the taste by re-mineralizing the filtered water. It's just a total waste of money, isn't it? At least not until we're forced to drink it. I even asked her if she could try the electrolysis on some Jane's water, but she refused, claiming she wasn't allowed to—though I'm certain the result would have been identical to just using tap water from the sink.

It would be quite amusing if our "little prize winner" used her special "flavor enhancer" to fix the demineralized water first, and then repeated the electrolysis... provided she's actually permitted to do so. The results would be sensational.