Reader's Digest Article on Drinking Water

Just curious if anyone else read the Reader's Digest Special Report in the Feb. 2008 issue entitled "Chemical, contaminants,pollution, price: new reasons to Rethink What You Drink".

In it they talk about not only the water but PETE and polycarbonate bottles. It got me to wondering about the supposed safety of PETE. And the limited amount of study that goes into these various containers before they are foisted on the public.

It seems to me everything is considered safe until it's proven not to be.

The article is worth reading IMHO.

I didn't see it but I wouldn't doubt it. In any case, the alcohol will kill me first I'm sure...

I read it and it was one of the worst articles I have ever seen. They just brushed over spring water and praised it for being a "fresh source". Spring water isn't regulated at all and the only stipulation to calling it spring water is that it is derived from an underground source. More often than not spring water is simply well water that may or may not have passed through a granulated carbon filter. Then they complain about all these chemicals being in the water while at the same time criticizing bottled water for not containing fluoride...which is a deadly substance.

All of the people they interviewed were saying that since bottled water is made from municipal water it is the same as drinking tap water. This is not the case at all. During RO, DI, distilling, or any of the other popular water filtrations nearly everything is removed from the water. The product water would be the same no matter what the source water was, so why wouldn't the bottling companies use municipal water?

I guess the environmental impact of the plastic waste is valid, but no to home brewers. I don't know anyone that makes a 5 gallon batch of beer by purchasing a few cases of 12oz bottles; everyone uses the 5 gallon bottles which are completely reusable.

I could go on, but I really don't care if people drink tap water or bottled water. Drink what you like; I am just sick of articles like this and every episode of 20/20 trying to scare people to death. Especially about stupid trivial things like this.

i've tried to move away from the PETE water bottles myself and along with it my brew setup. seeing that warm temperatures tend to make things leach out of materials easier it disturbed me to think i was making a grain tea in a plastic bucket. i've almost been able to completely phase out plastic in my setup when handling hot wort (which i will complete entirely once i have finished my counterflow chiller).

it may just be piece of mind, but i'd rather be safe than sorry.

i'll have to check out the article.