How Does Bottled Water Compare to Home Water Filters and Tap Water?

Modern society depends largely on its water supplies from mainly two sources: one is the normal tap located in every home throughout America and the other is our newest and best-selling competitor in the beverage industry – bottled water.

However, a little known truth is that bottled water is often not as clean as we are led to believe and often does not even come from a natural spring. To get a glimpse of the truth one need only take a look at current legislation pertaining to bottled water. In addition, we have to ask ourselves where home water filters fit into the current scenario.

The Truth behind Bottled Water

The sad truth is that many brands of bottled water are at best the same as tap water with or without home water filters. Many of them are found to be even more harmful. The reason for this is that the policy on bottled water is that they only need to be on par with tap water according to a loose set of criteria defined by every state. According to the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA), “companies that promote bottled water as being safer than tap water are defrauding the American public.” This is all good and well, but where’s the proof?

In 1999 the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) published in its “Bottled Water, Pure Drink or Pure Hype?” report that 40% of all bottled water originates from the same sources as tap water without being passed through the industrial equivalent of home water filters. In addition the report highlights the fact that up to 70% of all bottled water gains exemption from FDA standards, as said standards only apply to water being sold across state lines.

Yet even between tap water and bottled water there are a number of discrepancies in their requirements:

Where tap water requires basic filtration (not associated with home water filters) and disinfection, bottled water remain exempt from these requirements.

Municipal tap water must be free of a number of bacteria such as E.coli as well as a fair amount of pathogens including Cryptosporidium and Giardia before being relayed to the public. Once again, bottled water is not subject to these measures. In addition, bottled water needn’t be free of a number of known cancer causing chemicals such as phthalate which occurs in plastic.

Bottled water giants are not required to publish or make public the statistics on their water findings whereas municipal water systems have to publish an annual “right to know” report, detailing the contents and the respective levels in drinking water.

The reality is that home water filters remain the average consumer’s best bet for improved health. These filtration systems remove most, if not all, of the harmful contaminants, leaving only essential trace minerals necessary to the body. It has also been shown that home water filters are more economical than bottled water, making it the cheaper, healthier alternative.