What kind of water do you drink?

[Jebus]

Here is a question to those of you who don't live in an area with clean tap water. How do you purify your water before drinking it? Do you buy bottled water? Do you use a water purifier? Do you use a water distillerer? I'm trying to figure out the best option. Distilled water seems very controversial although I suspect it is harmless.

[Minos]

Luckily I live in area, with high quality tap water. But the topic is very interesting.

Distilled water should be safe given person is getting enough minerals by other means (food, supplements).

About water purification, do you have any actual limitations, or the question is theoretical?

[Jebus]

Tap water is not great where I live although many locals drink it without major problems. I use a simpe water purifier although I am doubtful of its effectiveness. I thought about getting a distillerer as I need distilled water for other purposes and buying distilled water is neither cheap or environmental. Then I thought if I own a distillerer I may as well use it for my drinking water. My main issue is that it isn't a very green solution.

[Jamie in Chile]

We get 20 litre bottles (of the type found in offices with a little tap at the bottom) delivered to the house.

I also take tap water and filter it, then put iodine in it. If your water comes out the tap clear and transparent, iodine may work on its own.

The iodine also has a benefit that a vegan diet is low in iodine.

However if I iodise all my water I will end up with too much iodine, hence the bottled water is also needed. You have to know what your doing with iodine. If you put the wrong amounts - like make a factor of ten error - you could be in trouble so that's a consideration. Double checks the maths with me if you are going to try the iodine route.

The filter is only going to take out large particles, not virus or bacteria or maybe some others. They probably shouldn't be trusted on their own.

[Jebus]

Thanks @Jamie in Chile . I'll look into the iodine option. I do the 20 litre bottled option while at work but I still drink almost 2 litres a day while at home. Would that be too much iodized water? Can regular iodine supplement be put in the water or do you buy something specific for water?

[Minos]

There are combined filters which can solve problem mentioned by Jamie. One part is active carbon to filter large impurities and second one is UV lamp to kill viruses and bacteria. It is on market long enough (more than 10 years), so you should have enough to choose from.

[Jamie in Chile]

1 milligram per litre of iodine is approximately the right amount - less than that might make sense if you just wanted to kill bacteria and knew there weren't any viruses. Higher than that might make sense, if, say, you were drinking from a very dubious source while traveling to a foreign country, and long term iodine build up wasn't a concern. You also need more than 1mg/l if you want to drink the water an hour later. I make my water for the next day and leave it overnight. The iodine can take some hours to kill viruses. I got to 1mg/l from some articles citing WHO and some science.

1mg happens to be the recommended upper limit of iodine according to US guidelines, meaning only 1 litre of iodized water. The association of UK Dietitians say that safe adult intakes should not exceed 0.6 milligrams per day (0.6 litres). Allowing for consumption of iodine in food in addition to that, 1L per day would actually put you above these limits.

However those guidelines look conservative.

An article I read said that 1-5 milligrams per day is common In Japan (where there is more iodine-rich seafood) without problems. 3mcg per day safe limit recommended in Japan so you could drink 2 litres+ if you go with the Japanese advice.

There are also studies by Freund et al.(48) and Thomas et al.(57), who iodinated the water to three Florida prisons. They found minimal changes and no clinical problems when water with 1 mg/L iodine was provided to prisoners for up to 3 years and presumably they drank multiple litres per day.

I drink 1.5 litres of iodized water on most weekdays but on weekends I often don't and some weekdays I forget to make it the night before, so my average is 1L of iodized water per day or less. I've been fine.

In conclusion 2 Litres per day is probably fine but 1L per day is safer. If you are uber conservative, and want to make sure you are within every guideline, you would have to actually do less than 1L per day on average.

[Sapphire Lightning]

I was drinking D2O, but then I grew an extra arm for some reason... So now I stick with the H2O that comes out of the tap. The tap water here isn't too too bad.

[brimstoneSalad]

A good distiller is going to use a heat exchanger to heat up incoming water/cool the steam. If you can find one that does that, it's not as bad. Shop based on efficiency. Bonus if you run it on solar power only during peak production.

Otherwise, get a reverse osmosis filter.

Or go totally green and let nature do its thing with a bog filter and a slow sand filter? There are designs that easily provide enough drinking water... Although I'd still boil at the end.

Depends on your contaminants though. If it's mainly biological bog filter and slow sand should solve your problem. If it's heavy metals not so much.

[Jebus]

A good distiller is going to use a heat exchanger to heat up incoming water/cool the steam. If you can find one that does that, it's not as bad. Shop based on efficiency. Bonus if you run it on solar power only during peak production.

Otherwise, get a reverse osmosis filter.

Thanks. I haven't been able to find any low energy distillers and since I'm not on clean energy that option is off the table for now. I'll probably pick up an osmosis filter and bring back next time I travel.