
Unfiltered Fervor: The Rush to Get Off the Water Grid - dankohn1
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/29/dining/raw-water-unfiltered.html
======
JohnJamesRambo
Misunderstanding of science and logic while thinking you are a genius may be
the hallmark of this decade. Call the decade the Dunning-Krugers.

Hey some places do have subpar water, I live in one with arsenic and chromium
flirting above EPA guidelines. But a $150 reverse osmosis system from Amazon
and a $30 deionizing filter after that if I want to get crazy and almost a 0
ppm TDS (Total Dissolved Solids) reading on a $10 eBay TDS meter solves that
problem. It provides almost limitless fresh perfect water to drink.

~~~
ivanhoe
Do you remineralize that water before drinking?

~~~
bastawhiz
Besides flavor, does it matter? If it's not for the flavor you can eat like
three almonds to make up for the loss of minerals.

~~~
midnitewarrior
Water entering your body with a trace mineral deficit will dilute the mineral
content of your body, and you'll excrete these minerals every day in your
urine.

One day or one week doing this is no big deal, but if it's your main water
source and you do it all the time, you will start demineralizing your body and
you'll be short of electrolytes which is known as hyponatremia.

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyponatremia](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyponatremia)

It can also cause bone density issues during child development.

~~~
Retric
People tend to get a lot of sodium from their diets making the sodium content
in their water a non issue. The same is generally true of most other minerals,
unless your diet is horrid the water you drink is not going to make a
meaningful difference.

~~~
Xeoncross
There seems to be a difference between minerals already dissolved in water,
and taking dry minerals straight.

Part of this may simply be the combination of other minerals and foreign mater
in the water that somehow helps the body absorb correctly.

Just like eating whole vegetables vs eating isolated plant supplement
extracts.

------
japhyr
_He said “real water” should expire after a few months. His does. “It stays
most fresh within one lunar cycle of delivery,” he said. “If it sits around
too long, it’ll turn green. People don’t even realize that because all their
water’s dead, so they never see it turn green.”_

The marketing speak these companies utilize makes me cringe. As a science
teacher, I aim to help students develop the ability to critically analyze
claims like these. I think half of the people in charge of these companies
believe their own hype, and half of them are just doing it to take money from
uneducated people.

~~~
throwawy123117
It's definitely cringe-worthy, but I don't doubt the turning green part: a
fish tank will do that too from algal growth, which is almost certainly what
is happening to their "real" water.

~~~
ivanhoe
It's really about the level of ammonia/nitrates in the water and a
sufficiently strong source of light, that's all that algae need. It will
happen to any water that sits a few weeks in open air so that spores can get
into it. Even a regular tap water with added chloride will turn green if it
has at least some level of nitrates in it (and usually they have).

------
dankohn1
Yes, the founder of Juicero has re-emerged: After his juicing company,
Juicero, collapsed in September, he went on a 10-day cleanse, drinking nothing
but Live Water. “I haven’t tasted tap water in a long time,” he said.... “You
have to be agile and tactile, and be available to experiment,” he said.
“Literally, you have to carry bottles of water through the dark.”

~~~
j_s
On mobile I tend to stick to just HN; is this "for reals"? I couldn't make
this stuff up!

Edit: Yes, though even the photos remind me most of the YouTube​ comedian
'AwakenWithJP'
[https://m.youtube.com/#/channel/UCwUizOU8pPWXdXNniXypQEQ](https://m.youtube.com/#/channel/UCwUizOU8pPWXdXNniXypQEQ)

------
throwawy123117
I grew up drinking raw water in New York State. It was connected to the tap,
so it was available for all cooking and for filling a glass at any moment. We
could even bathe in it. Of course, there was a reason: my parents lived beyond
the reach of municipal water grids and so had to source their water from a
well in the back yard. This is not uncommon outside urban bubbles.

These "live water" individuals are morons. It's unbelievable what people will
pay for. This is anti-science, and anti-progress. I've been to Sierra Leone, a
place where all water is "live" and they have never added flouride or
chloramine. Want raw water? Go live there and enjoy the cholera and dysentery.
Municipal water grids are a triumph of urban development. Early New York City
understood it, they built the first tunnel to import meteoric water in 1917,
because people did not want to drink nearby water made filthy by their
neighbors and by industrial development. Hell, even the Romans got it: you
need a water system for a large population, and it has to be safe water. This
is something we have only improved with treatment. Have there been missteps
with lead pipes? Sure. But they aren't actually a problem unless the water
their carrying has a pH that will solubilize the metal.

If you want to drink healthful water: use a multi-stage filter.

As an aside, let me tell you: having a well can be terrible. We're talking
unbelievable minerality that you either remove via ion exchange with a water
softener or that you watch clog your pipes, faucets, and water heater. Haven't
experienced soft water? It tastes salty, and it feels like you can never fully
wash soap off. When I was young I had to take flouride tablets because, of
course, none was added to our water. The dose was a bit higher than in city
water. I've never had dental carries, and I have my careful pediatrician to
thank. We could afford the tablets, but in a different circumstance we may not
have been so fortunate. The poor in cities get flouride for free thanks to
municipal flouridation. Of course there is also the risk of the well running
dry during droughts, and during blackouts there is no water because well pumps
are electric. That means no toilets either. Where there is no city water,
there is no city sewer either, so waste ends up in a septic tank that needs to
be pumped out every couple years. That of course prohibits having a garbage
disposal. It goes on and on. City services are valued for good reasons. The
wealthy should be championing them, and fostering their improvement and
expansion, not opting-out with bogus "live water" and vague misbeliefs about
health.

~~~
paganel
> This is something we have only improved with treatment. Have there been
> missteps with lead pipes? Sure. But they aren't actually a problem unless
> the water their carrying has a pH that will solubilize the metal.

I 100% concur on your statement about the advancements we've made, but
unfortunately things are not so black and white outside the urban US and some
Western European countries. For example, I live in an Eastern European
capital, in an apartment building built in the early 1980s (so it's not that
old) but, nevertheless, I cannot drink tap water because the pipes are just
too rusty. One can notice that every couple of weeks or so, when the water is
temporarily stopped, and when it comes back on the first burst is red-ish, and
it keeps being red-ish for at least 10 or 15 seconds after that, after which
it turns back to being clear. There's no way I'm drinking water that flows
through those rusty pipes.

~~~
throwawy123117
Sure, the same rust spurt happens when I shut off the water in my house to fix
a valve since air can suddenly access what normally has only water contact. It
may be unpalatable, but if it is brief it should be safe and fixable with
filtration. Reverse osmosis would definitely solve the taste problem, but then
you need to worry about adding minerals back in (good multi-stage systems will
do this).

~~~
seanmcdirmid
It’s not just the rust, it’s the lead in the pipes, the abestsos, and so on.
Developing countries are just different, you can’t compare their problems to
developed country ones.

~~~
throwawy123117
All removed with basic filtration+activated carbon. I've spent time in
countries at the bottom of the human development index. (Good) filters are
enough.

~~~
seanmcdirmid
And arsenic? We aren’t talking about western style contaminates here. Sure a
good filter can remove 70% of the arsenic from your water, but...

~~~
throwawy1231172
Doable with various techniques, to varying levels of effectiveness. Activated
carbon is the cheapest, but not the most effective. Definitely tractable.

[http://www.oregon.gov/oha/PH/HealthyEnvironments/DrinkingWat...](http://www.oregon.gov/oha/PH/HealthyEnvironments/DrinkingWater/SourceWater/Documents/gw/arsenicremoval.pdf)

[http://www.who.int/water_sanitation_health/hygiene/om/linkin...](http://www.who.int/water_sanitation_health/hygiene/om/linkingchap6.pdf)

------
Nokinside
>What adherents share is a wariness of tap water, particularly the fluoride
added to it

At the same time most 'natural ground water' in the west coast has naturally
higher fluoride content than what is considered safe. Municipalities remove
fluoride, they don't add it.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_fluoridation#/media/File...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_fluoridation#/media/File:Groundwater-
fluoride-world.svg)

------
paulus_magnus2
Watero. $25 bags of clean water freshly filtered your personal $500 dispenser

~~~
buckminster
Once you've tasted cold-pressed water you won't drink anything else.

~~~
api
People will buy it. Look at the audiophile market.

~~~
patcheudor
Please buy my tone rocks. For just $2000 you'll get a set of not one, but four
tuned rocks which you place precisely 66.7mm away from your midrange speaker.
They enhance the undertones and make midtones shine. You've never experienced
an audio enhancement quite like this for just $2000. Order today.

------
oneplane
This just seems plain stupid to me. How can a government not provide one of
the most basic, most essential services that we even see as the first thing to
provide to third world drought-ridden places? There are a ton of NGO's in the
USA that (so they say) make wells and clean water available in Africa, but
when it comes to tap water at home it is so bad that people turn away from it
and away from the scientific backing on how tap water should be.

It always amazes me that in some countries (or areas within those) you still
can't expect safe tap water, and still have a large 'bottled water' industry
and consumption. It doesn't help anyone and it doesn't align with the idea of
setting up a specialised entity and supply them with resources to do it
(a.k.a. water supply company and governing instances).

We expect normal, clean water that is just water and not added with anything
for 'our benefit' out of the tap, and that's what we get. It's tested, and
there are multiple different grids with individual sources and individual
filters. It's not hard to do, it's what we have here; it costs almost nothing,
and doesn't fail. Strangely enough, one neighbouring country (France) doesn't
have this uniformly (don't drink water in Paris...) but in another (Germany)
the water is just fine again.

You'd think that a civilised country that sets up organisations and systems to
deal with basic needs at scale would be able to accomplish their designated
tasks.

------
username223
_So_ cringe-worthy. I drink lots of "raw" water on camping trips, and the only
difference I've noticed is a bout of giardia (easily treated, but highly
unpleasant). Bottled water in general is an insult to the environment and
human progress; bottled "raw" water is all that plus forehead-smackingly dumb.
The fact that potable water is almost free is a triumph to be celebrated.

------
j_s
Anecdata: a dentist mentioned flouridated bottled water as an option since the
parents didn't realize their kids were missing out with "regular" bottled
water.

To me it's interesting to consider the long-term impact of all products that
are consumed/applied frequently (both manufactured and natural ones, though
somehow natural usually seems less worrisome). I believe it is best to
introduce fairly dramatic variety just to give the body a chance to dodge any
long term accumulating effects/deficiencies... but this hasn't translated into
a soap-switching schedule yet! (a very low personal priority thanks to mass-
market manufacturing similarities).

Water supply selection seems to be one of the most critical choices in this
department; I appreciate this chance to learn from what other HN users have
researched and implemented as best.

~~~
pmorici
When I was in elementary school we lived out in an area dominated by rural
farmland. I'm guessing close to 100% of the students at the school got their
water at home from an untreated well. Once a month the school nurse would
bring around little cups of fluoride mouth wash and we would swish with it for
3 minutes then spit it out.

If you are seriously concerned about fluoridated vs non-fluoridated water
there is no reason that the two things have to be linked. Heck, you can get
many mouth washes with fluorine in thing. Listerine has a fluoridated version
for example.

~~~
j_s
True! Another commenter mentioned tablets from the pediatrician.

These days progress consists of companies marketing "healthy" improvements to
products that have become a convenient part of the daily routine.

~~~
twothamendment
We are in a well in an area without a lot of flouride in it. Our kids take
tablets from the pharmacy. I think they are about $2/month.

------
teh_klev
I had to double check I wasn't reading The Onion. Sure, public water supplies
in developed nations aren't without their problems, but I'd sure as hell
prefer to take my chances with municipal "processed water" than put myself at
risk from cholera or other water borne maladies that we more or less
eradicated over the past 120 years.

I thoroughly recommend "The Blue Death: The Intriguing Past and Present Danger
of the Water You Drink" by Dr. Robert Morris [0]. Kinda feels like these
quacks need to be reminded of the life and death lottery our water supply used
to be.

[0]: [https://www.amazon.com/Blue-Death-Intriguing-Present-
Danger/...](https://www.amazon.com/Blue-Death-Intriguing-Present-
Danger/dp/0060730900)

------
chakalakasp
“Water? You mean like in the toilet?”

Every day feels one step closer to Idiocracy.

~~~
twothamendment
I have a friend near Salt Lake who bought a house on an old property. When
looking it over the owner pointed out that it wasn't on city water, but a pipe
directly to a spring. A local company sells that same spring water, but he
flushes his toilet with it.

~~~
rjmunro
This reminds me of Blenheim Palace in Oxfordshire, England. They sell
expensive bottles of their mineral water in their restaurants, but it is the
same water that has supplied the buildings since long before there was a
municipal water supply in the area, so you can just ask for tap water and get
the exact same product for free, just without the glass bottle.

[https://www.blenheimpalace.com/estate/blenheim-palace-
minera...](https://www.blenheimpalace.com/estate/blenheim-palace-mineral-
water/)

------
kaycebasques
Leaving aside the pretentiousness of the "water consciousness movement", I'm
really interested in "decentralized" access to water, and I have a few
questions about this technology maybe one of you can answer:

Is it portable? For example, the article mentions Burning Man. Could you
theoretically bring this to a desert and extract water from the air? There's
probably enough sunlight in a typical desert to power the solar panels, but is
there enough water moisture in the air to extract?

(Context: I generally agree with the perspective that water treatment keeps
water safe to drink.) How could I test water from the ZMW system to ensure
that it meets similar safety standards as tap water? Could I process the
extracted water myself? What does that process look like?

I get the general sense that this particular system is being marketed to
wealthy people. Are there any similar systems that try to do this cheaply?
Maybe as a mission to make water accessible to everyone.

General question around climate change: is "more water moisture in the air"
one of the expected long-term effects of climate change?

~~~
mullen
> Is it portable? For example, the article mentions Burning Man. Could you
> theoretically bring this to a desert and extract water from the air? There's
> probably enough sunlight in a typical desert to power the solar panels, but
> is there enough water moisture in the air to extract?

You could not do this at Burning Man. During the event, the humidity level is
something like 3%. You literally don't sweat at Burning Man.

------
foreigner
Children's ice cream, Mandrake?

------
gaius
Zero Mass is prepping, it’s quite unlike so-called “raw water”

 _secure, totally disconnected from all infrastructure_

------
Pica_soO
In a game i work on, there is a faction of fanatic "green" monks, traversing
the desert. They plant glass trees, intricate structures, which use Silica-Gel
to collect moisture during over the day and night, collected heat to turn the
collected water into steam again, that is condensed near the root of the
structure into a glass cavern. There it waits for a capillar effect system
which pumps the liquids up at night.

Those glass trees would slowly terraform lifeless desserts back into green
pastures, while withstanding sandstorms and goats.

------
heifetz
how is the raw spring water described in the article any different from
bottled spring water like Perrier?

~~~
Spooky23
Probiotics and love (of separating a fool from his cash).

------
ricardobeat
[paywall]

------
tomohawk
Sometimes the crazy people are right.

Someone close to me used to have all kinds of health problems. These included
digestive tract problems, skin problems, and many others.

After seeing many doctors and specialists over many years, they were worse off
than when they started. They decided that maybe it was something in their
diet. They eliminated pretty much everything except water from their diet, and
that did not work.

Shortly after, they went on a trip where they were off grid for a few weeks.
During that time, the health problems started going away. When they got back
to civilization, the problems started coming back.

That's when the thought hit. What if those crazy people on the internet are
right about municipal water?

After some experimentation, it was determined that chlorinated water was the
culprit. They've moved to a house with a well and are much better off than
before.

Since then, I've met other people with similar health issues who have
benefited by eliminating chlorinated water as much as possible (drinking or
bathing). Some have installed large carbon block filters on their municipal
supply.

Chlorine has had undeniable public health benefits, but it is also a poison,
and affects some people in a very detrimental way.

~~~
GuB-42
I don't know about the latest research but I suppose a few people can be
intolerant to chlorine at a much lower dose than most people. It happens with
pretty much every substance, natural or man made.

As for your example, are you sure it is due to chlorine? From you description,
there are simply too many variables. Sure, he stopped using chlorinated water,
in fact, he changed water completely. He also moved. It means it can be caused
by the mineral composition of water, plumbing, air quality, volatile organic
compounds, etc... And all that is excluding psychological causes.

Anyways, I won't criticize your friend, he obviously made the right decision
because he feels better, no matter the underlying cause. The problem is that
to extrapolate to other people, we need more than anecdotal evidence.

~~~
tomohawk
We eventually did a double blind test.

Two buckets of water, one chlorinated. Dip a hand in each for a while. One
hand turns red. Neither the person offering the water nor the person putting
their hands in the water knows which is which.

The latest research is good for groups, but when its your own health, it may
not have much bearing.

------
guest
No credibility to those going off grid or those slandering them. There will be
idiots wanting things to be black or white with nothing in between - while
it's the scale that creates the ability to differentiate right from wrong and
what is what.

Fluoride has been linked as detrimental to IQ by Harvard - search and you'll
find the study (and afaik not only by Harvard, one example should be enough).

Regarding tap water it will soon be the organisation of it through the state
that stands between a massive "outbreak" of cancer in the population and
keepign up the current rates of it. -Fracking has created holes inbetween
water sources and oil/gas pockets - these are filled in by pumping down gravel
and cement. That mixture to begin with isn't even as "qualitative" as you
might think as pokects of other materials are created and as the layers of
rock, dirth etc shifts the material is ground down. Within 30 years there is a
really high risk of failure and over time the vast majority will fail -
resulting in a poisioned watertable. Do you really think the people who have
ownership of gas, oil and fracking companies will be held accountable by the
legal system? Or by corrupt politicians - many who surely had a hand in the
allowance to drill in the manner which has been done...

Tap water is the way to assure massive amounts of clean water to a population
- that however does not mean that it does not come without a cost (if it is
fluoride and a lowering of IQ to create a docile people or not) and that
tradeoff should be known - both the positive and the negative of it.

Transparency drives technological evolution, if the tradeoff is known and can
be argued to be problematic there is an incentive to come up with a better
solution.

~~~
Spooky23
NYC has been fluoridating water since the 1964. Doesn’t seem to have affected
IQ or made anyone docile.

~~~
ricardobeat
That is not a productive debate to be had. Conspiracies aside, there are
clearly questions to be asked: many studies show negative effects of
fluoridation such as an increased rate of fluorosis in children, over-
exposure, including evidence of neurotoxicity. Even more worrying, the sources
of fluoride used have been shown to be frequently contaminated by much, much
worse substances due to their origin as a manufacturing by-product.

Most importantly, countries that do not fluoridate water (~95% of the world)
have experienced the same reduction in tooth decay as the ones who do.

~~~
seanmcdirmid
They don’t call them UK teeth for nothing. It obviously does have an effect on
tooth decay, I’ve seen a lot more problems in my friends who come from non-
flouride societies with similar dental hygiene to myself.

~~~
ricardobeat
[http://www.bmj.com/content/351/bmj.h6543](http://www.bmj.com/content/351/bmj.h6543)

The UK is (was) actually one of the few EU members to fluoridate their water
for a slice of the population.

