trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

so i'm wondering if/when TSHTF
would utilities go down in quality - namely water quality
there could be rolling blackouts for electricity
but can anyone guarantee drinkable water quality after TSHTF

and for some who believe TPTB may be have a depopulation plan
sabatouging water quality could speed up this plan

and so the question is
would you trust/drink tap water after TSHTF ?

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

I will use tap water if available. If I have any doubts as to the safety of the water I will use filters/chlorination tablets which I have in great supply.

All fwiw.

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

Utilities in my state send out a water quality report to the public annually. The report states in milligrams per liter the chemicals and minerals in the water. Line power distribution would not have any bearing on water quality since almost all water systems have backup power.

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

i dont trust the tap water NOW so there is no way in hell i will trust it WTSHTF

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

That run on desiel power......and if this a prolonged incident the state will start to ration and the most important towns will get that fuel first..... and the odds are pretty likely your municipality wont make the grade.

All the hallmarks of a monster movie.

T

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

I lived in a mountain community and drank the tap water all the time.

The water bills were sent out every two weeks.

I did a fair amount of running then and so drank a lot of water.

Then I got sick. For four or five weeks. A lymph node swelled up the size of a golf ball. Went to the doctors and after a blood test the Dr. looks at me and says "I don't know WHAT you've been doing but your blood is FILLED with bacteria."

Later my landlord told me that [after] he had paid the water bill he had gotten a notice from the water district that due to the high amount of rain fall in the area that the coliform count in the tap water had reached unacceptable limits.

Just something to keep in mind.

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

As far as pathogens go, there is nothing better than injecting ozone into the water to kill them.

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

Ooops, I need to correct myself.

The water bill went out every two 'months'.

I don't know if [they] knew about ozone treatmnent then. (This was in the 70s)

But I do know that that started a LOT of mis trust on my part and believing even the freaking local utility companies will cover their ass before they will consider doing the right thing.
And...I lost my job because I was sick for so long. Ba$#$%ds.

I've queried this company about the shelf life of the Oxygen treatment product. If it's got any 'legs' to it, I'll buy it.

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

Oh, in regards to the original question of the thread,

In San Diego County, during the wild fires the town of Ramona and the surrounding areas were told NOT to drink the tap water as the water treatment system had gone down. This was not a warning due to just bacteria but other contaminants as well.
So if you do have a SHTF scenario come up, you might need to find out what your water company does to the water before sending it to your faucet.

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

In some parts of the world, ozone has been used for over a hundred years.

""Ozone is a more effective disinfectant than chlorine, chloramines, and even chlorine dioxide. An ozone dose of 0,4 mg L-1 for 4 minutes is usually effective for pre-treated water (low NOM concentration) [39]. Several studies proved that ozone, unlike chlorine products, can deactivate resistant micro-organisms"


http://64.233.167.104/search?q=cache...lnk&cd=8&gl=us

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

Gotta remeber ozone as well for the prep pouch.


T

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

Looks like you need electricity for this to work though.

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

Ozone is truely unique . Many health benefits as well as disease fighting qualities. That is why they throw people in this country in jail for using it. Even Dr. Atkins found out that he was not supposed to use it. Video of that was on youtube, but it looks like it has been pulled.

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

A 500 watt generator is all you need if you got enough gas to run it for a few minutes.

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

Having a source of safe drinking water is probably one of the most basic parts of prepping, imo.

Having and knowing how to use hand pumped filters and purification tablets is a must, but one should also be familiar with basic survival situation water procurement techniques, imo.

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

Ozone is the best disinfectant, but it is unstable and has to be generated as it is being added to the water, this requires electricity. It is its inherent instability that makes it a great disinfectant; when it breaks down from O3 to O2 it violently oxidies any organic matter in the water.
Chlorine is cheap but if there is humic acid in the water, and there usually is, nasty by products can form such as trihalomethanes and dichloramines, which are carcinogenic. Chlorine dioxide is better, it does not form byproducts as readily and requires a lower dose, but is more expensive.

I am a water professional, and what you should be most worried about is fluoride. I won't even cook with tap water, not because of what they take out of the water, but what they put in. If you have not looked into the sorrid history of fluoride, do so, you will feel sick, betrayed and extremely angry.
I threw out all my toothpaste about a year ago.
healthy teeth, rotten brains

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

If the truth be known, I bet clorine requires electrictiy also.

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

I'm sure the process of purifying chlorine into gas suitable for adding to drinking water requires electricity at the chemical plant. The difference is that chlorine gas can be put into pressurised cylinders and will stay viable indefinately.
Ozone has to be generated onsite, and within 30 minutes at the most is is no longer ozone, it is regular old o2, that is, it cannot be stored.

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

I filter my water now,soooo......:no_ma:

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

I am not sure what your point is. I remember some years back that Milwaukee water had a pathogen that chlorine could not kill. That is why they went to ozone as the primary treatment of their water. A reduction of chlorine used is a benefit with the use of ozone. Also, Los Angeles and many cities in Europe use it extensively instead of relying on Choline alone, which some studies say is cancerous.

"The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has endorsed Milwaukee's drinking water as among the highest quality in the nation. Milwaukee's decision to invest in ozone disinfection and continuous monitoring of process control parameters and water quality characteristics using online instrumentation has paid off for consumers who rely on a low-cost supply of safe drinking water."


http://water.mpw.net/

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

I don't drink water because fish f#ck in it.

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

I voted yes, but I would not drink it from the tap without first filtering/boiling it.

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

I don't trust it now.

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

I voted yes, with one caveat.. all my taps are already filtered through ro membranes. 'They' can throw anything in that water and it will always come out perfectly clean on my end. So bring on the fluoride.

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

...Do you rely on anyone else to support you or are you self-sufficient?

That is THE question.

Who are you dependent on for survival? If the answer is anything other than "self"..then you have some work to do.

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

Make sure that you are taking a good multi-vitamin/multi-mineral. Water is a natural solvent and because R.O. water is so pure, it will strip minerals from your body and you could risk developing deficiencies and get very sick if you don't supplement properly.

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

Ooohhh!! But that makes it tastie!!!

OK, I have drunk water out of a muddy hole dug two feet into the ground. But I put two iodine tabs in it before I drank it. That was a long 20 minutes.

That was a long time ago.

Guys, DON'T DRINK BAD WATER!!! IT WILL KILL YOU. Iodine, chlorine, berkey, whatever. If you suspect it is bad, protect yourself.

s

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

Wow, this is a really cool idea. I even have a bath tub I never use that this would be perfect for. Thanks.

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

I've heard that in some areas where natural disasters have hit, residents have refused to drink the potable water brought in because of the aftertaste of chlorine or other purifying agents that have been used. What's the best way(s) to remove and/or cover such tastes that remain in the water?

pure water
 

Reverse osmosis is the best for the price. Only distilled is better but is quite expensive. My RO unit reduces from 360 tds at the tap to 15 or less at the spigot. It can be reduced to 0 with the use of DI cartridges, which I've never used. The 0 still contains something though and is not absolutely pure, but much better than the water at the tap. I wouldn't count on fluoride not getting through the membrane, but it will be much less than it is at the tap.

The best thing is to get ALL the tds out of the water, because there's not much of anything good in it these days. Check the water reports. Also don't count on a simple filter like the berkey, as they only get large particles out of the water but not small ones, and don't reduce the tds in any noticeable manner. It says the same thing on their site, and which I've posted elsewhere.

Regarding chlorine, my RO starts with a 0.5 micron sediment filter, followed by a 0.5 micron carbon block filter, the membrane, then the tank. The carbon block gets out the chlorine. I also have a 5 micron filter where the water comes into the house.

Someone posted on here about pumping water through the RO unit in case the water pressure was gone. Any ideas of how to do this?

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

How about water well on ur land use some sort of filter..has someone done it?

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

I have an old well, but it hasn't been drawn from since the 50's. I'm sure there is alot of water in there, but is it good to drink? I don't know

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

Excellent point. RO water is in fact an aggressive solvent. I try to supplement with a multi vit/min every few days.
Nevertheless, it is a great way to detox.

Re: pure water
 

You'd need a high pressure booster pump. Preferably using a diaphragm design. Approx 40-60 psi should suffice for most efficient filtering through the membranes and with the least amount of permeate/waste water. Pm me if you want any manufacturer recommendations.

I've been planning on purchasing a 12volt booster pump and depending on the wattage / amperage it operates at purchasing a sufficient wattage solar panel and battery.

Worst comes to worse, you would still be able to filter any water source through your RO membranes at ease.

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

Take a sample to your local health unit and have it analyzed for bacteria and other nasties. No charge where I am from. A tablet or two of chlorine wouldn't hurt a week or two before the initial test, and then do several tests after.

If the wellhead (drilled well or dug) is well bermed to shed rain away from the outside of the casing/tile, and the top has been well sealed, the water is likely good. The casing on the other hand may be shot, but would be well worth replacing on a good volume well.

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

this is a big well. It was described in the 50's property sale pamphlet as being bigger than my entire towns well is today. It was used for locomotives and factories in the 1800's, so it is very old. And there is another well half its size on my property that I cannot even find. Was told of its existence by an oldtimer who is now dead.

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

Wow. POINT OF SOURCE WATER FILTRATION, people. Solid carbon block with or without pre-stage ceramic filter. Should filter down to at least .5 micron or better yet .2 micron. Think Multi-Pure, Katadyne, Berkey Light, or even Ecoquest water filtration systems...Do it now! Yikes.

Clean drinking water is the first survival consideration. Never trust municipal water now or when SHTF.

I haven't drank straight tap water in 25 years...since I lived in L.A.

By the way, that carcinogen someone is referring to is TRIHALOMETHANE..

From WIKI:
Trihalomethanes are formed as a by-product when chlorine or bromine are used to disinfect water for drinking (commonly known as disinfection by-products). They result from the reaction of chlorine and/or bromine with organic matter in the water being treated. The THMs produced may have adverse health effects at high concentrations, and many governments set limits on the amount permissible in drinking water. In the United States, the EPA limits the total concentration of chloroform, bromoform, bromodichloromethane, and dibromochloromethane to 80 parts per billion in treated water. This number is called "total trihalomethanes" (TTHM).

Any of the above filters should eliminate THMs.

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

Here in the gay marriage capital, Gaylafornia, the water treatment they have started using is called "toilet to tap"...they treat the pooh and pee pee once and inject it into the ground for six months, then pump it out and send it to your tap...yummy! Throw in all the crud in the aging pipeline and your crusty old pipes and you have a real toxit cocktail.
No thanks!
I'm getting ready to buy the Big Berkey soon!
I hear you can drink your own pee out of these things.:tongue_ma:

http://www.frugalsquirrels.com/store...big_berkey.jpg

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

"Toilet water" is recycled in Arizona as well but is only used for irrigation.

Unfortunately, the water that comes out of the tap isn't really much better.

Those Berkey systems are great...but you're gonna have to add your own flouride. :wink:

Re: pure water
 

Don't waste your money on something like a Berkey, that hardly does anything.

Re: pure water
 

What makes berkey so good anyway? Give me some real info.

The website www.berkeyfilters.com looks unprofessional to me.

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

Or silver!!

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

does the berkey actualy get the floride out?

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

That Tap Water Is Legal but May Be Unhealthy
December 16, 2009


The 35-year-old federal law regulating tap water is so out of date that the water Americans drink can pose what scientists say are serious health risks — and still be legal.


Only 91 contaminants are regulated by the Safe Drinking Water Act, yet more than 60,000 chemicals are used within the United States, according to Environmental Protection Agency estimates. Government and independent scientists have scrutinized thousands of those chemicals in recent decades, and identified hundreds associated with a risk of cancer and other diseases at small concentrations in drinking water, according to an analysis of government records by The New York Times.

But not one chemical has been added to the list of those regulated by the Safe Drinking Water Act since 2000.

Other recent studies have found that even some chemicals regulated by that law pose risks at much smaller concentrations than previously known. However, many of the act’s standards for those chemicals have not been updated since the 1980s, and some remain essentially unchanged since the law was passed in 1974.

All told, more than 62 million Americans have been exposed since 2004 to drinking water that did not meet at least one commonly used government health guideline intended to help protect people from cancer or serious disease, according to an analysis by The Times of more than 19 million drinking-water test results from the District of Columbia and the 45 states that made data available.

In some cases, people have been exposed for years to water that did not meet those guidelines.

But because such guidelines were never incorporated into the Safe Drinking Water Act, the vast majority of that water never violated the law.

Some officials overseeing local water systems have tried to go above and beyond what is legally required. But they have encountered resistance, sometimes from the very residents they are trying to protect, who say that if their water is legal it must be safe.

Dr. Pankaj Parekh, director of the water quality division for the City of Los Angeles, has faced such criticism. The water in some city reservoirs has contained contaminants that become likely cancer-causing compounds when exposed to sunlight.

To stop the carcinogens from forming, the city covered the surface of reservoirs, including one in the upscale neighborhood of Silver Lake, with a blanket of black plastic balls that blocked the sun.

Then complaints started from owners of expensive houses around the reservoir. “They supposedly discovered these chemicals, and then they ruined the reservoir by putting black pimples all over it,” said Laurie Pepper, whose home overlooks the manmade lake. “If the water is so dangerous, why can’t they tell us what laws it’s violated?”

Dr. Parekh has struggled to make his case. “People don’t understand that just because water is technically legal, it can still present health risks,” he said. “And so we encounter opposition that can become very personal.”

Some federal regulators have tried to help officials like Dr. Parekh by pushing to tighten drinking water standards for chemicals like industrial solvents, as well as a rocket fuel additive that has polluted drinking water sources in Southern California and elsewhere. But those efforts have often been blocked by industry lobbying.

Drinking water that does not meet a federal health guideline will not necessarily make someone ill. Many contaminants are hazardous only if consumed for years. And some researchers argue that even toxic chemicals, when consumed at extremely low doses over long periods, pose few risks. Others argue that the cost of removing minute concentrations of chemicals from drinking water does not equal the benefits.

Moreover, many of the thousands of chemicals that have not been analyzed may be harmless. And researchers caution that such science is complicated, often based on extrapolations from animal studies, and sometimes hard to apply nationwide, particularly given that more than 57,400 water systems in this country each deliver, essentially, a different glass of water every day.

Government scientists now generally agree, however, that many chemicals commonly found in drinking water pose serious risks at low concentrations.

And independent studies in such journals as Reviews of Environmental Contamination and Toxicology; Environmental Health Perspectives; American Journal of Public Health; and Archives of Environmental and Occupational Health, as well as reports published by the National Academy of Sciences, suggest that millions of Americans become sick each year from drinking contaminated water, with maladies from upset stomachs to cancer and birth defects.

more . . .


http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/17/us...er=rss&emc=rss


17
19
23

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

Run everything through a Berkey, just as a pre caution.

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

I voted "other", as I have stored water.

However, if TSHTF big enough to affect water distribution, the last thing I will be worried about is whether my water is ultra pure.

If I can drink it and it doesn't make me immediately sick or dead, I reckon that will probably be good enough.

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

I'd rather filter and boil water out of my pond then trust tap water, especially after TSHTF.

If stored supplies get low, a solar water still is my next choice.

Great water info: www.survivaltopics.com/survival/water/

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

i don't trust it now. i don't care to drink sodium fluoride.

it's definitely worth learning to distill liquids - evaporate & condense them using, for example, stainless steel and glass (food quality) fixtures.

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

Amen.

The whole poll is silly, because unless your municipal system is totally gravity fed, once the grid is gone, there won't BE any tap water for you to worry about. I doubt very seriously that many water utilities have put in backup power for two reasons....one, grid power has been so reliable so long that they simply wouldn't spend the money on a backup.....two, unless it is a very small system, the pumping stations would be so scattered as to require a generator at each station. Then, of course, there is the fuel re-supply issue. IF TSHTF, fuel will be virtually non-existent in a short while, because it TOO is electrical grid dependent.

Local snowstorm here this week, heavy, wet snow with ice as a bonus, breaking down trees and power lines all over....several municipalities already calling for water conservation because their pumping capacities are out, and once the tanks up on the hills are empty, it's over.

More locally, most of the neighbors in my valley are on wells, and totally dependent on grid power to run their deep well pumps....so not only are their houses dark, but they have no water either. Neighbor buddy of mine was helping me clear a fallen pine out of the road/off a downed power line yesterday morning, along with his wife and two sons....so I invited them all up to breakfast. His wife steps over to our kitchen sink to wash her hands so she can help my wife pat out some pork sausage ( we had 50lbs of fresh in the fridge from a hog kill/cutting the day before ) and she exclaimed "Hey.....you not only have water, you have HOT water"......

Well HELL YEAH I do....and it ain't some accident. Gravity fed spring to 3,000 gallons of storage to the house, heated with propane, and have a wood fired backup system ready to go.

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

a year and half late, but another addition to my GIM quotes file :ok:

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

this poll/thread has been here for 1 1/2 years

i would hope this thread got some members THINKING " WHAT IF ? "
and then hopefully
those member(s) ACTED on " WHAT IF ? "

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

Would you drink water that came out of this pipe?
I don't think cities test the water at your tap.
http://www.pipeproblems.com/wp-conte...erculation.jpg

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

Re: trusting tap water after TSHTF
 

That looks like morgellons, growing in the pipe.