Close-up of tap water
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If you are like most Americans, you are aware that water supplies are not as dependable as we would like. Over 2100 contaminants have been discovered in drinking water thus far. Our water source may be free of some of these, but who knows which are still present?

Many reading this will have acted on these warnings and stopped drinking faucet or well water. For you only filtered water is worthy of your family or yourself. That means you are either purchasing bottled water, or that you have bought a water filter and are purifying it yourself.

You have the water problem solved at home, but what do you do when you go on vacation or take a camping trip? How can you guarantee you will get the same quality of water you are getting at home? If you are purchasing bottled water, then you can just take a case or two along with you. That is the most expensive option in the long run. In spite of water being abundant and free, drinking water is, in some forms, more expensive than gasoline. Also, you will probably discard the bottles and this just adds to the environmental landfill problem of non-biodegradable plastics.

Some of you have purchased a gravity feed filter. In the long run, you will save money over purchasing bottled water. If you have room, why not pack your water filter in the car and filter all drinking and cooking water on your vacation? This would provide all the water you need and would guarantee it to be as pure as you get at home. Neither will you have the problem of discarding bottles.

If your device to filter water is not portable or you simply don’t have room to take it, What is the next option? Plan ahead and filter extra water now to take with you on vacation. Store it away so that you have ample clean pure water from home.

The problem is, in what do you store and transport it? You know the water is clean when it leaves the filter. You certainly don’t want it deemed unsafe because of the container. This is a very real concern. The PET bottles (made of polyethylene terephthalate) used by most bottled water companies, are, as far as we know now, safe as long as they are kept in cool places. Water stored in them at higher temperatures for a period of time might become contaminated with chemicals from the bottle. Reusing them is not sanitary either.

Some have opted for the more expensive hard plastic bottles used for sports drinks or water coolers.  The National Institutes of Health recently demonstrated that bisphenol, the chemical used in making these bottles, may cause neurological problems in preborn babies. We don’t know the long range effects on adults. Perhaps it is too risky to store and transport water in those containers too.

Few choices remain. You want the purified water from home but can’t bring the filter. If you take filtered water from home and store it in unsafe containers, you defeat your purpose. The solution to this dilemma is to filter extra water at home and store it in glass containers. This would include bottles, jars, and glass lined thermoses.

This solution solves several problems. We not only have the clean water we want, but we also don’t contribute to the environmental problems of discarded bottles. In addition, we have the peace of mind, knowing that the water is pure and safe, and the containers can be washed and reused without contaminating the water we drink.

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