How to Select Bottled Water!

All water is not equal! Labels can be confusing and ingredients vague. Read on for tips from an insider in the water industry.

Instructions

Difficulty: Easy

1. A bottle of water has standards that must be met according to the Food and Drug Administration. There are International Bottled Water Associations standards (IBWA), Food and Drug Standard (FDA), Local and State rules. Each of these works together to make the water industry a vague mystery.
2. Reverse Osmosis: (RO)
   Almost all bottled water goes through a filtration system, but Reverse Osmosis is special! Reverse Osmosis actually takes 98% of dissolved minerals and all of colloidal and suspended matter out of the water by using sand, gravel and activated carbon before sending the water through 0.05-micron filters to an osmotic pressured membrane. This water is about as pure as you can get, unless the manufacturer adds chemicals to produce a "mouth taste". These added chemicals MUST be listed on the label. What isn't listed is the fact that these added chemicals are extremely hard on kidneys, especially people who are prone to developing kidney stones. Reverse Osmosis water is labeled as Bottled water, Drinking Water, or Purified water. It is all the same thing, just a label change for different types of "markets"!
3. Spring Water:
   Spring water must come from a spring, and has some pretty strict codes that must be followed. The spring itself must be tested yearly and every load taken out of the spring is tested before and after bottling. There are very few additions to spring water, but it is purified with ozone. Ozone is a gas that will dissipate through plastic after a few hours. When ozone was first used the industry used high levels, up to 5.0. They learned the hard way that levels that high would leach the plastic out of the bottle and turn the taste of the spring water. (This is true for all water!) Have you ever had a bottle of water that tasted like plastic? Chances are good that the ozone levels when bottled were too high. Will this hurt you, no, but it tastes bad! Ozone levels now are much lower and used in conjunction with UV lights.
   One hazard of ozone addition to spring water is if the spring has bromine in it. Bromine occurs naturally in the earth, but when combined with ozone, bromine turns into bromate, which can cause Bromate poisoning. Symptoms are abdominal pains, hearing impairment, and kidney failure and at high enough doses, may cause death. Animal studies have shown that bromate is a mutagenic and carcinogenic to the kidneys especially. The FDA has stepped in and for the past few years ozone levels have been kept very low and Ultra Violent light has been added for sanitation purposes. The pH factors are closely monitored because a spike in pH indicates a problem.
4. Distilled Water:
   Distilled Water is in my opinion the best! Distilling is accomplished by bringing water to a boil and catching the vapors. It is by far the purest form of water available on the market. It is however free of minerals that are important to life, so if you drink only distilled water you may want to take a mineral supplement.

Tips & Warnings

• Read your label!
• Avoid added chemicals!