LBN: Public Data Show Chemicals in Tap Water

This was posted in LBN:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x1997828

Public Data Show Chemicals in Tap Water

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20051220/ap_on_sc/tap_water

Loved the spinned statement of the Fed...

Also, the following database looks very good and thorough. Down to the smallest town.
http://www.ewg.org/tapwater/findings.php

(This is a duplicate post to what I posted in LBN)

...these days is just being dumb or stubborn. I bought my first tap water filter back in about 1986 after experiencing the nasty tap water in S. California, but I think Central Florida is even worst, but nothing compares to the horror of Destin, on the Florida Pan-handel, Yuck!

Destin water is almost un-drinkable. You can taste the salts, sulfur and who knows what.

But good tasting water in not a good indicator of good water, the water in my home town in Indiana tasted great but, as I later discovered about 5 years ago through the magic of the Internet, most of the ground water in my neighborhood and 70% of the cities tap water was so contaminated that they were declared Super Fund Clean-up sites by the EPA, back in the 1980's.

Of course, the contamination, and the harm to peoples health, happened in the 1970's, but without the internet and all News alternatives it provides, this was never general knowledge as it never made the Front page of my (and I'm not making this up) hometown paper "The Elkhart Truth." Hey, why would anyone question the info provided (and not provided by) The Elkhart Truth? (If you think I'm kidding, here's a link: <http://www.etruth.com/#>

When I found this info at the EPA website in about 2000, I found that my hometown had Three (3) EPA Super Fund clean-up sites: One less than a mile from my house (where we used unfiltered Well water and another that was the cities MAIN Well field that supplied the city with water.

70% of the cities drinking water had been contaminated. Tests in 1978-79 showed this, but the EPA clean-up didn't start for more that 10 years. The well field was declared cleaned up in about 1993.

My family doesn't have a history of cancer, but very soon after moving into the house that was near the Super Fund site, my mother developed Cancer of the Uterus resulting in a full hysterectomy. I had a lot of learning difficulties in school, but we are not sure if it was the water or from a head injury from when I was 1 1/2. Plus, all of our Cats developed stomach tumors (cancer) and none live past the age of 10, one died at about 4 years, and the others between 9 and 10 even though we only lived in that house for 5 years. I recently told my vet about this and she said it was very likely related.

Anyway, back to Water filters. I used the "Instapure" by Teledyne Water Pik for years, but switched a few years ago to PUR, because I discovered that the "Instapure" is only a NSF "Reduction Class 2" filter. A class 2 filter only filters out Chlorine and some of the things that effect taste, for real protection from the really harmful stuff, you need to get a "Class 1" filter which removes 99.99% of the bad stuff, including Lead, which is still part of most plumbing (Leaded Brass). Not all of the PUR filters are Class 1, so you have to read the packages carefully. The PUR "Ultimate" filters are Class 1.

If you have a filter and don't know what "class" it is, here's a link to NSF, which is a independent non-profit organization: <http://www.nsf.org/Certified/DWTU/>

Of course there are chemicals in water. There are chemicals in just about everything you eat even organic produce. The only real question is if it is at a level which would be harmful or not.

Bring me any glass of water on Earth and arsenic will be in it along with dozens of other substances which are dangerous at a high enough concentration yet at the vanishingly small concentrations we're talking about there is zero threat. Science education in the US has sunk so low that the ignorant herd can get riled up over every little bit of non sequitur.

This would be what my Chemistry proffessor calls Chemophobia.


LETS BAN DIHYDROGEN MONOXIDE(H20)!!! :sarcasm:

In some cases the issue is merely better detection. Modern tandem mass spec/GC or LC systems are simply better at detecting some chemicals, which can be routinely detected at tens of a picomolar concentration. As detection improves one can see impurities or problematic compounds at levels that were not previously possible. The mere dectectable presence of a "toxic" compound does not mean it is at an action level; however neither is always the case that the presence of toxic compounds is of acceptably low risk.

There really ARE some chemical compounds that are indeed problematic and legitimately deserve concern. In particular, there are compounds that are sparing soluble but appreciably toxic - things like benzene - that can contaminate huge amounts of water because they are toxic at their maximal aqueous concentration, and are continuously extracted from point sources (like leaky gasoline tanks) into water supplies.

The public is rather immune from critical thinking, but the matter is simultaneously neither as trivial nor as important as one may think. The reality is situational. One should attempt to educate oneself about one's own water.

I have a rather elaborate water purification system in my house (we have local perchloroethylene contamination) and I am rather glad that I do. The risks of cancer from perc are not enormous, but it is a risk worth reducing, particularly for my young children.