Your drinking water contains dihydrogen monoxide

takeahike

The truth about American drinking water: Report shows widespread presence of hazardous chemicals. Check yours out by zip code here.

Between the ongoing controversy around fluoridated water and the recent discovery of a chemical in our water systems that may or may not be toxic, the safety of American drinking water is murky, to say the least.

And today, with a new report revealing that tap water is delivering harmful chemicals like PFAS (“forever chemicals”), heavy metals, and radioactive substances to millions of Americans—often at levels far beyond what scientists consider safe—it got even murkier.

The latest update to the Tap Water Database, from the non-profit Environmental Working Group (EWG), reveals that 324 contaminants were found in drinking water systems across the country, with almost all systems having some amount of detectable contaminants in its water. That’s according to safety data collected between 2021 and 2023 by EWG from nearly 50,000 water systems in every state (except New Hampshire, which did not provide its data).

Sparkchaser

takeahike Check yours out by zip code here.

Checked on that site. Report shows everything below legal limits but above EWG guidelines. Not a chemist but looks like you would need Reverse Osmosis to get what they want.

Interesting site.

Dks01

takeahike My drinking water comes from Lake Huron. It tests well below any contaminants. I like my water cold, so I drink it from a pitcher in the fridge.

GeekGirl1

That's why I have a whole-house filter.

FYI - There's a typo in the tag title - "that" should be "than". The OP can edit the title as shown in this post.

If you want to have some fun, try changing the title to "Your drinking water contains dihydrogen monoxide".

Background: DHMO.org - It's a teaching moment on how to think about what you are reading.

Rook

GeekGirl1 That looks like one of the oldest websites on the internets.
Entertaining though.

thos-edison

GeekGirl1 My favorite part is the dihydrogen monoxide. If they remove that, I don't know what I'll do. I'm also quite partial to hydrogen hydroxide.

Somewhat-Reticent

Also murky is whether filtering provides more benefit than just vendor revenue.

Rook

I live in NYC and get a Water Quality Report in the mail every year.
It seems like they're doing a pretty good job with it. No complaints from me.

For fellow New Yorkers, there's a link to download the 2023 report on this page: https://www.nyc.gov/site/dep/about/drinking-water-supply-quality-report.page

takeahike

Rook I live in NYC and get a Water Quality Report in the mail every year.

NYC has always had a reputation for the best water in the country. When I was in college at CCNY the professor told us that they work on the citywide plumbing constantly ever since it was established, as it supposedly takes 100 years to replace the whole system, at which point they have to start all over again because at least at the point where they first started it the repairs are again in need for new plumbing.

Thane_Bitter

Rook Because your system is based on concepts that are thousands of years old, water flows downhill, and also don't shit where you drink. NYC has a wonderful water system, it's headlands are protected green spaces, the rest of the system is mostly gravity based requiring little power to move it.

JanJ

Well here. Tested on first use, and years later.
4 years ago, we switched from 10 to 5 micron filter. Last year we added a UV process after filter, and yet another test. All is fine. I see no reason for yearly testing.

Rook

Sparkchaser EWG seems to have much stricter guidelines that the EPA.
From the few contaminants that I checked, the guidelines were based on the California Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment's public health goal, or peer-reviewed studies by EWG.
A lot of the contaminants I looked at are formed when disinfectants (like chlorine) are added to the water.

Luckily the site has links to different types of filters... 😉

Rook

takeahike That sounds about right, considering the amount of water (over a billion gallons a day) and how far that water has to travel (the Delaware Aqueduct alone is 85 miles long).
And the water has to be continuously treated and tested.
Constant maintenance and protection of the system is a huge job.

Heat84

Thane_Bitter Because your system is based on concepts that are thousands of years old, water flows downhill, and also don't shit where you drink. NYC has a wonderful water system, it's headlands are protected green spaces, the rest of the system is mostly gravity based requiring little power to move it.

But what about the 150 year old pipes that the water flows through? When I hear bad things about the tap water in NYC, I wonder if it's the water itself that's bad or the pipes.

Somewhat-Reticent

Heat84 And reservoirs, tunnels, aqueducts? Big complex system.

Thane_Bitter

Heat84 Pipes likely, as well as other things as I said the city is old, it also has a certain fascination with rooftop water tanks which may not be well maintained. A pile of pigeon poop or the occasional dead bird (or even body) could be floating inside one. It starts off in good shape, much like the Internet service, it's the last mile or so that can really screw things up.

May cities draw water from rivers they dump their treated (and untreated sewage back into), others draw from wells that are out drawing the infill rate of the aquifers they use. Even cities that pull from the Great Lakes are having issues with several things including toxic algae blooms. Overall its a bleak picture for most, but for NYC they do have protected headlands which will help them.

just_4_fun

Our Water sucks, we get warning all the time about the water department failing its own testing. The last mailing would be almost comical if it weren’t so serious, one of their own lab employees got caught fabricating the test results. No other info provided other than they were removed from the position, remember the old saying “fu*k-up and move up”. In any case in 2018 I had enough and put in whole house filter. I remember my first shower with the new system, I even felt cleaner and water in a clear glass is no longer cloudy. I installed a manifold for three bypass lines, one for the toilet and two for the outside hose bids. For the code people, kind of out of sight with the poor image quality there is a ground strap from the inlet side to the outlet side of the filter.

Rook

Thane_Bitter Yeah, it's mostly the old service lines from the mains in the street to the houses or businesses. The problem there is mostly lead. The water is treated with Orthophosphate to keep any lead that may be present in these pipes from leaching into the water.
The DEP offers free test kits (for lead) and I believe there's also an ongoing program to replace the lines.

Somewhat-Reticent

Many water systems depend on upstream flushing …

broknsymetry

Could the Brits have gotten it right?

Brewing tea reduces toxic heavy metals in drinking water, study finds

Good news for tea lovers: That daily brew might be purifying the water, too.

In a new study, Northwestern University researchers demonstrated that brewing tea naturally adsorbs heavy metals like lead and cadmium, effectively filtering dangerous contaminants out of drinks. Heavy metal ions stick to, or adsorb to, the surface of the tea leaves, where they stay trapped until the used tea bag is disposed of.

Somewhat-Reticent

broknsymetry "when left to steep for 24 hours" with "empty cellulose bag"?
Who brews their tea that way?

Thane_Bitter

broknsymetry Reading the study it seems that it's the teabag that is collecting the contaminates, the tea itself provides compounds that help aid that collection process.

"The cotton and nylon bags remove practically no heavy metals from water," Shindel said.

In other words you must have a cellulose tea bag that is floating free and clear and not have any tea inside to ensure all of its surface area is available for use.