[BlueJack]

Out of curiosity I looked up the water quality here in Miami-Dade County and found this info below.

There are a few things I have questions about. I don't believe there is some grand conspiracy by the government to poison the public, or anything like that. I think they try to do "the greatest good". That being said there are things in the water that I'd rather not drink, or put in my fish tank. Even though levels of Uranium, Lead, Radon, Chlorine, Radium, Arsenic are relatively low in our water, the number I would like to be putting in my body is 0. I know it's very unlikely to die from such low levels of carcinogens, akin to being hit by lightning I'm guessing, but since I have a choice of what I drink I'd like to eliminate these things from my water.

That's kind of a long preface to my question....so, is there any way to remove these carcinogens? I'm thinking something like an RO system would work best. I have no idea of what is good/bad, or what to look for in such a system. I'm sure some do a better job than others. What's the top of the line? And which systems are useless? If I want something for my house and not just my tank, what do I look for? Thanks for any help!:icon_smil

http://www.miamidade.gov/wasd/library/report/water_quality_2010.pdf

 

[KevinC]

Just FYI - drinking water is not the only thing you ingest with carcinogens in it. And I'm referring to naturally-occurring ones, not man-made. Tomatoes and black pepper are two examples of foods that contain carcinogens that the plant itself produces. In other words, I wouldn't worry too much about it.

Kevin

 

[Jeffww]

These are all natural minerals. If you drank "spring water" you're getting the same stuff in. Don't worry about it. Flying in a plane is probably more cancer causing than living off city punch. Also that chlorine is added. Do you eat salt? Then you're eating chlorine bro. 100% safe to ingest.

 

[jasonpatterson]

The part of this that would concern me most are the organic contaminants. It looks like at least one sample came out above the EPA's limits, and all of them had some level of contamination. The level of radon looks high, but the units are confusing, a few hundred pCi/L of radon is nothing to sneeze at, but it's not particularly high either. In some parts of the country people with wells have radon levels in the 1000's of pCi/L which do require treatment.

The plus side is that if you're interested in treating your drinking and cooking water rather than every drop that comes into the house, a simple filter (PUR, for instance) on your tap will remove nearly all of the organic contaminants, heavy metals, and radon from the water. It takes a few minutes to fill up a stock pot with water, but if you're not doing that daily then who cares? The filter housing itself costs about $30 and comes with at least one filter cartridge. Additional filters are roughly $10 and need replacing every 100 gallons or so. As far as bathing and washing dishing/clothes, there's really nothing to be concerned about.

Do you eat salt? Then you're eating chlorine bro. 100% safe to ingest.

Chloride ions (from salt) and chlorine or hypochlorous acid (from water treatment) are two very different things. At these levels I agree entirely that they are 100% safe though.

 

[BlueJack]

Just FYI - drinking water is not the only thing you ingest with carcinogens in it. And I'm referring to naturally-occurring ones, not man-made. Tomatoes and black pepper are two examples of foods that contain carcinogens that the plant itself produces. In other words, I wouldn't worry too much about it.

Kevin

Whoa...I didn't know that. Interesting.

 

[BlueJack]

These are all natural minerals. If you drank "spring water" you're getting the same stuff in. Don't worry about it. Flying in a plane is probably more cancer causing than living off city punch. Also that chlorine is added. Do you eat salt? Then you're eating chlorine bro. 100% safe to ingest.

Thanks for the quick response. I'm not too worried about chlorine...I'm more worried about the by-products it produces. When chlorine interacts with organic matter in the water it can produce Trihalomethanes(i.e. Chloroform being a commonly recognizable one, there are many hundreds that are not monitored). Trihalomethanes are known cancer causing agents.

There are also other things in the water that are not good at any amounts. There is NO safe level of lead in drinking water. Just because you can put together a good team of lobbyist's and get the EPA to agree that 15 (ppb) is "so called safe" doesn't fly with me.

Radon - nobody would advocate putting this into your body, in any amounts.

So, I guess I would ask is there anything you can do about this. Or just suck it up and wear it?

 

[BlueJack]

The part of this that would concern me most are the organic contaminants. It looks like at least one sample came out above the EPA's limits, and all of them had some level of contamination. The level of radon looks high, but the units are confusing, a few hundred pCi/L of radon is nothing to sneeze at, but it's not particularly high either. In some parts of the country people with wells have radon levels in the 1000's of pCi/L which do require treatment.

The plus side is that if you're interested in treating your drinking and cooking water rather than every drop that comes into the house, a simple filter (PUR, for instance) on your tap will remove nearly all of the organic contaminants, heavy metals, and radon from the water. It takes a few minutes to fill up a stock pot with water, but if you're not doing that daily then who cares? The filter housing itself costs about $30 and comes with at least one filter cartridge. Additional filters are roughly $10 and need replacing every 100 gallons or so. As far as bathing and washing dishing/clothes, there's really nothing to be concerned about.



Chloride ions (from salt) and chlorine or hypochlorous acid (from water treatment) are two very different things. At these levels I agree entirely that they are 100% safe though.

Thank you. I really appreciate your input. Do you think it would be cheaper to use a small RO unit over the long run? I don't know how an RO unit works specifically? Is it similar in that you need to replace filters continually?

 

[KevinC]

There are also other things in the water that are not good at any amounts. There is NO safe level of lead in drinking water. Just because you can put together a good team of lobbyist's and get the EPA to agree that 15 (ppb) is "so called safe" doesn't fly with me.

I've measured lead in drinking water before so I have some insight. We cannot reliably measure lead in water at much below 5ppb. So the 15ppb limit is based on what we can measure. Now thinking that through - if we can't measure it below 5, we can't know that 1ppb is not safe.

Another source of lead in drinking water is actually your own house. Older homes have lead in the solder used to connect the copper pipes. As the water sits in those pipes, it dissolves a little lead. I've seen numbers over 100ppb from stagnant water out of pipes - while the water collected after letting it run for a while is well below 15ppb.

I think the drawback to RO is that you are wasting a lot of water - about 3:1. And I'm not sure how efficient they are when you're talking about 15ppb or less.

Kevin

 

[Fishly]

Whenever something has been identified as a carcinogen, hasn't it been because a large number a people were exposed to exceptionally high levels of it before they developed cancer? Yet many cancers seem to have a genetic component involved. So, maybe your chances of getting cancer from small levels of carcinogens is determined by your genetics (in which case it's more like an allergen than a poison), while it takes very high levels to cause people who don't have the genetic predisposition to get cancer.

As long as you don't have a family history of the cancers caused by these chemicals, maybe you shouldn't worry about it. I say "maybe" because I know everyone has something they worry about and try to protect against to make them feel safe enough to enjoy their lives. For me, it's germs. I wash my hands like crazy, even though I don't worry about a lot of other things that may be more dangerous to my health than germs. If filtering your water will give you peace of mind, I say go for it, whether your water is polluted or not.

 

[HD Blazingwolf]

EVEN IF YOU USE RO it doesn't remove the information stored by the water being in contact with the harmful materials.. theories here

http://www.active-water.com/en/harmful_substances.html

and im on a work computer or i'd find the scientific article that is blocked?

do some research on dr. ludwig

water can store resonant frequencies from materials it comes in contact with. these frequencies can do as much harm as the chemicals themselves..

 

[Jeffww]

EVEN IF YOU USE RO it doesn't remove the information stored by the water being in contact with the harmful materials.. theories here

http://www.active-water.com/en/harmful_substances.html

and im on a work computer or i'd find the scientific article that is blocked?

do some research on dr. ludwig

water can store resonant frequencies from materials it comes in contact with. these frequencies can do as much harm as the chemicals themselves..

*fwoosh.

I don't believe in homeopathy or far infrared bro. Sorry but it'll open up a can of worms if you start talking about stuff like that. All I'll say is that I respectfully do not agree.

 

[Hoppy]

EVEN IF YOU USE RO it doesn't remove the information stored by the water being in contact with the harmful materials.. theories here

http://www.active-water.com/en/harmful_substances.html

and im on a work computer or i'd find the scientific article that is blocked?

do some research on dr. ludwig

water can store resonant frequencies from materials it comes in contact with. these frequencies can do as much harm as the chemicals themselves..

You should be able to do some more research and find that this is nonsense. Nothing can "store resonant frequencies". In fact "resonant frequencies" is not even a thing or a substance, it is just a characteristic of vibrations. There are lots of real hazards in the world without manufacturing imaginary ones just to sell products.

 

[HD Blazingwolf]

that is why i put theories........ i read the article like 3 days ago.. so it was on my mind when i read this post

however ther ewas a more scientific article i really wanted to post... AND
water molecules do form different shapes when comming in contact with magnetic fields from other substances and those created within your own body. i do believe water is affected by everything including the synapses in my own brain

touch a water bottle holding pure water and think nice thoughts then look under a rediculously powerful microscope. dark electron.. and see what the molecules look like.. what them change after u shake the bottle or expressive other thoughts

i've seen this with my own two eyes frm what i thought was a hoax. is there proof. hardly but i do believe most things i see for myself

also vibrations are harmful to your joints... so resonant frequencies although not a soild object may work on the same principle.. just a thought..

 

[Fishly]

water can store resonant frequencies from materials it comes in contact with. these frequencies can do as much harm as the chemicals themselves..

So wouldn't the RO filter affect the frequencies itself? It should have some kind of effect on the water, once the offending chemicals are removed.

touch a water bottle holding pure water and think nice thoughts then look under a rediculously powerful microscope. dark electron.. and see what the molecules look like.. what them change after u shake the bottle or expressive other thoughts

As someone with OCD, I can tell you that that's a road you don't want to go down. Person A was angry when he touched the water that Person B spilled which touched that car which ran over a mud puddle which splashed on my yard... now I have to move. Seriously, getting bullied once in school is going to do more harm to you in 20 years than drinking water from a bottle that was sitting on the bus seat next to that bully.

Remember, people. Water, vitamins, and hemoglobin are all chemicals. Life is dangerous. Accepting that will make your life better than trying to fight it.

 

[HD Blazingwolf]

OH I ACCEPT. which is why i clean my tank with glass cleaner weekly on the outside.. its an aerosol.. and spray checmicals in my house.. my fish aren't dead.. those chemicals are present everywhere with our modern world... just like our bodies are full of parasites and eww icky nasty stuff. i accept it..
i just want to understand it knowledge is fun


HAHAHA and a fun note.. i was the kid that got put in the trashcan at the end of school... girls gave me swirlies in between classes.. i was vastly undersized for my age..... how do you think u would feel as a man, if a girl in middle school was strong enough to give u swirlies.. THAT will affect your life

 

[BlueJack]

I've measured lead in drinking water before so I have some insight. We cannot reliably measure lead in water at much below 5ppb. So the 15ppb limit is based on what we can measure. Now thinking that through - if we can't measure it below 5, we can't know that 1ppb is not safe.

"In 1974, Congress passed the Safe Drinking Water Act. This law requires EPA to determine the level of contaminants in drinking water at which no adverse health effects are likely to occur with an adequate margin of safety. These non-enforceable health goals, based solely on possible health risks are called maximum contaminant level goals (MCLG) The MCLG for lead is zero. EPA has set this level based on the best available science which shows there is no safe level of exposure to lead." - EPA

It's not really economically feasible to do this though. I mean, are you going to replace the plumbing of the entire country? So, like most problems, if you throw enough money at it, it will go away. Intense lobbying led to a 50 ppb safe level in 1991, and has steadily declined to where it is at now, 15ppb safe level.

Another source of lead in drinking water is actually your own house. Older homes have lead in the solder used to connect the copper pipes. As the water sits in those pipes, it dissolves a little lead. I've seen numbers over 100ppb from stagnant water out of pipes - while the water collected after letting it run for a while is well below 15ppb.

Thanks! Definitely running my water for a bit before I fill my tanks or drink any water. I knew each house is different based on when it was made and what plumbing materials where used, but I didn't know that about sitting water in pipes.roud:

The only reason lead worries me a little is because I drink so much of it(almost 1 gallon of tap water daily). And I haven't seen any studies on long term exposure to small daily doses. I can see how that would be a tough experiment to run and control the variables for 30 - 40+ years. For that matter, I haven't seen any studies on low dose/long exposure for many of the substances in our water....

 

[Fishly]

Here are some links about house RO:
http://remco.com/homero-cost.htm
http://www.excelwater.com/eng/b2c/wholehousero.php

Definitely running my water for a bit before I fill my tanks or drink any water.

Be careful during droughts and watch your water bill. If you want to be eco-friendly, collect the "grey water" and use it for watering your plants, etc.

 

[BlueJack]

Remember, people. Water, vitamins, and hemoglobin are all chemicals. Life is dangerous. Accepting that will make your life better than trying to fight it.

Very true. You could walk outside today and get hit by a bus. Chances are you won't though. All you can do is stack the odds in your favor to the best of your ability.

 

[Fishly]

Stacking the odds only works if you're making your life better by doing so. If you are so worried about protecting yourself from disease and death that you can't enjoy your life, good odds aren't really helping you. Most people worry about one or two things and then let the others slide, which is fine, but sometimes it can take over their lives.

 

[BlueJack]

i just want to understand it knowledge is fun

roud: