What Water to Drink?

Tap water may be stinky, but it may also be your healthiest option

by Seth Gordon

Editor's note: The Washington Free Press has over the last few years published a number of articles on concerns about the toxicity of fluoride added to public water in many localities, including Seattle. As another perspective, we publish this article, which points out some positive aspects of public tap water in comparison with the main alternative, bottled water.

The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), which conducted a study of 103 different brands of bottled water and published its report "Bottled Water: Pure Drink or Pure Hype" (March, 1999), concluded that over 54 percent of Americans drink bottled water and about 36 percent drink it at least once a week.

People who detect taste and odor problems in tap water frequently associated those problems with risk. Many people therefore drink bottled water because it tastes better than tap water.

The high cost of bottled water has also brought many consumers to conclude that it is of a higher quality than tap water. Some brands of spring water can cost up to $7.50 per gallon. The NRDC calculates that it costs 240 to 10,000 times more per gallon to purchase bottled water than it does to purchase tap water. Profit margins for bottled water are large, between 25 and 30 percent. In 2001, Perrier's US revenues totaled $2.1 billion. Nestle, which owns Perrier, sells bottled water in 160 countries using 72 different brands and totaled revenues of $4.5 billion in 2001.

But if you purchase bottled water for its purity, taste or health benefits, you may not be aware of the potential health risks. Bottled water is an unknown quantity, a gamble; it could be of high quality, or it could be laced with bacteria, cryptosporidium, arsenic, or heavy metals. The tap water in Seattle, for example, may not taste as good as bottled water does, but when you consider the environmental impact of bottled water and actual levels of contaminants in bottled and tap water, bottled water can seem a costly and risky alternative.

Environmental Concerns with Bottling

All that bottled water has to come from somewhere. More than 50 percent of America's drinking water comes from underground aquifers. A company that mass-markets bottled water can deplete a local aquifer, leaving less for people in the area who may depend on it.

Most plastics used for bottled water are either polyethylene terephthalate (PET) plastic bottles, that leave a faint sweet or fruity plastic flavor, or high-density polyethylene (HDPE) plastic jugs--used for one-gallon milk jugs--that add a slightly-melted plastic flavor to drinking water. Regardless of any problem that leaching of the plastic into the water might present, there is a large environmental load created by the use of so many plastic containers. Although these plastics can be recycled, they often aren't, and they are not biodegradable. In addition, there is far less efficiency in the delivery of water bottles--which must be trucked to far-away locations--than in the delivery of local tap water.

But perhaps the main environmental concern with bottled water is that it is often not very pure. Many bottled waters probably compare unfavorably with your local tap water.

The Safe Drinking Water Act, or SDWA, of 1996, which is the current regulatory law of the land, requires the Environmental Protection Agency, or EPA, to regulate public drinking water as a utility, while it requires the FDA to regulate bottled water as a food product. The SDWA requires that both the EPA and the FDA use Maximum Contaminant Levels (MCLs) as guidelines to determine if a water system or bottled water company is in violation of health practices.

The SDWA regulations require publicizing results of water testing to the American public. The EPA requires public water systems to test their water in government certified labs. Those test results are reported to the EPA and compiled into a comprehensive report, called a "right-to-know" report.

Right-to-know reports contain all of the test data that a tap water system collects throughout the year. Any tap water system that exceeds any MCL has to report it to their state EPA, develop a plan to resolve the issue and inform the public of the violation by including the information in its right-to-know reports until the issue is resolved. Because both the EPA and the public have access to right-to-know statistics, tap water systems strive to keep the levels of contaminants in their water far below the required MCLs.

In contrast, bottled-water violations need not be reported at all. The FDA has adopted many of the EPA's tap water standards, however bottled water companies can work around the FDA's limitations. Numerous loopholes allow water bottlers to market unregulated waters. Most consumers are unaware that many different types of bottled waters are not regulated by the FDA. The FDA only requires that if water exceeding MCLs is sold, the phrase "contains excessive contaminants" must be printed somewhere on the bottle's label.

The FDA also does not require bottlers to certify that they know how to safely treat and deliver water. Bottlers are not required to test water after storage, nor do they have to give water a bottling date. The result is that bacteria can grow unchecked from bottling day forward. The FDA regulations presume that the inside of a water bottle is not a sustaining environment for most bacteria, and, therefore, bottled water does not require a bottling date; however, several studies document the growth of organisms in bottled water after bottling.

Policing the Bottlers

A 1998 survey of 43 states found that the states on average employ fewer than one person per state to assure compliance with the bottled water regulations, which means that bottled water companies can expect an FDA investigation once every five years. Unless a bottled water company is a member of the IBWA and follows their recommendations, the public's only protection is the bottler's decision to self-regulate.

Members of the IBWA have to adhere to the IBWA's "Model Bottled Water Regulation" code. The code is a list of MCLs that are much lower than those the FDA requires of bottled water companies. (For information on the IBWA, its code, and its member companies, see www.bottledwater.org .)

To enforce its code, the IBWA subjects its members to a surprise annual inspection conducted by a third-party independent organization. While voluntary regulation improvements are commendable, they are not adequate for ensuring drinking water safety.

Residents of any city can access and analyze their tap water system's right-to-know reports and determine if they need to improve water safety at home. The NRDC "Bottled Water" report advocates establishing a "public's right-to-know" for bottled water similar to what is now required for tap water. The IBWA argues that bottled water producers are already required to provide information about product source, manufacturer, and contents. Bottled water consumers can obtain additional information from the manufacturer whose contact information is printed on the product label.

Comparing Contaminants

When deciding what water to drink, it's handy to know about some of the possible contaminants and how they compare in different types water available.

One big concern is cryptosporidium. This is a common parasite found in water, can cause up to two weeks of severe diarrhea in an otherwise healthy person and is found in surface water throughout the world. Cryptosporidium can withstand relatively high temperatures (although boiling generally knocks it out), and can even survive in pure chlorine bleach. Bottled water companies are not required to test for cryptosporidium, with the rationale that cryptosporidium is a surface-water parasite, and as a surface-water parasite it cannot contaminate underground aquifers, which is where mineral and spring water comes from.

However, many bottled waters are not necessarily mineral or spring waters, and may simply be standard surface tap water that is bottled and marketed. If that is the case, check the label and make sure that the water has been treated by reverse-osmosis, filtration, or distillation, which can significantly lessen the chance of cryptosporidium. (Note: because reverse-osmosis and distillation also remove beneficial minerals from water, regularly drinking these without having other sources of minerals may lead to a nutritional deficiency.)

The Cedar River Water Treatment Plant, which serves Seattle, is in the process of adding ultraviolet radiation and ozone filtration methods to its treatment methods. Officials hope that these new methods will completely remove cryptosporidium from Cedar River drinking water. The NRDC believes that once the new water-filtration methods are in place, "Seattle will have among the most advanced treatment plants in the United States."

A much more serious health risk found in bottled water is the poison arsenic. Long-term exposure to even low concentrations of arsenic may cause lung, skin, and bladder cancer as well as diseases of the blood vessels, liver and other organs. Arsenic can enter water in many ways. Water systems that depend on underground sources of water are especially at risk. The test data lend the conclusion that both spring and mineral waters, which come from underground sources, are likely to contain arsenic. This includes some of the most expensive bottled waters. Consumer Reports magaznine tested for common contaminants in water, such as arsenic levels. They found that the average arsenic level for Vittel water was 14 ppb and one of the three tested bottles of Calistoga Sparkling Mineral water had an arsenic level of 18 ppb. Volvic Natural Spring Water, with arsenic levels ranging from 12-14 ppb, was best. Contrast this with EPA standards for arsenic in public tap water at10 ppb, which all public water systems must comply with by 2006. In Seattle, arsenic is actually listed as undetected in all of SPU's online right-to-know reports.

A very common concern is lead, which is more of a concern in tap water because of the presence of lead in plumbing pipes and fixtures. (Again, keep in mind that a lot of bottled water is simply tap water, and if it is not micro-filtered or distilled, there is still a chance that it can contain significant amounts of lead.) Seattle residents who are concerned about the lead content should know that the Seattle Public Utilities expects to meet the federal lead MCL level when it completes its 2004 monitoring. This will require 90 percent of the homes tested to have lead levels below 15 parts per billion (ppb).

Tap Water can be Better

Bottled water--even that from a spring or mineral source--is by no means free of contaminants, and by some measures can be less pure than your local tap water. Many brands of bottled water--especially those not labeled "spring" or "mineral"--are simply tap water in a bottle, which is sometimes further treated, sometimes not, and which can be left to sit in plastic containers for long periods before sale. As an alternative to bottled water, your local tap water may actually compare favorably, and if you use a good home water filter, you can improve your tap water yourself, and help spare our landfills from untold tons of plastic waste.

Miryam Gordon assisted with editing the above article

Editor's note: for readers interested in removing fluoride from tap water, it's important to note that most types of household water filters will not remove any fluoride, although reverse-osmosis home filters will remove 80 to 90 percent of it. The only way to completely remove fluoride from home tap water is by home distillation. On the downside, both distillation and reverse-osmosis remove beneficial minerals from water. See www.fluoridedebate.com/question12.html for more info. Seattle tap water is still fluoridated despite concern from many environmentalists and a call for a moratorium on fluoridation by the Sierra Club. Fluoridation has recently been banned by local governments in Honolulu and Oahu Island, and the cities of Santa Cruz, Redding, and Watsonville in California. A court in Pierce County, WA recently found that water authorities there could not unilaterally fluoridate water without public consent.

Doug Collins