Drinking Filtered Water Vs. Drinking Bottled Water

Some Straight Dope on tap vs. bottled. To start off, some of the things that are obivous, yet not that obvious right off the bat.

Bottled water is a food product. It is sold as such by food producing companies, or food product companies, such as Coke, Pepsi, and a host of others. As it is a food product it is regulated by the Food and Drug Adminastration, or the FDA. There has been a fair amount of attention in the last 5 - 10 years about the FDA and their activities. The FDA isn't exactly forthcoming and seems to not top have proclivities towards transparency about the products they regulate. Granted, nothing that will out and out harm you, but things that do damage over time. bottled water has actually been proven to contain, in some brands but not all, more toxins such as arsenic, lead, etc, per parts per million in its water than most municipal tap water. RBSt milk is a great example of just what the FDA, even though it supposedley doesn't have any toxic effects from drinking it, is willing to let slip.

Tap water is managed by the Environmental Protection Agency, or the EPA. The EPA has stringent standards when it comes to the toxicity of the drinking water of municipalities (cities, towns, etc) and has dozens of employees in each location dedicated to just that job. The FDA, by comparison does not have very many employees devoted to just monitoring bottled water. EPA approved water, on average, has less toxins per parts per million than some bottled waters.

Now that's the first part, which is which regulating agency controls which. The FDA, if you examine their track record, is less likely to side with consumers than with producers, whereas the EPA is all about the environment, and therefore the people. That being said, not all tap is created equal, and some areas have tap water you really don't want to drink. Los Angeles, for instance. Well, just living in LA is considered bad for most people. At any rate, most municipal sources in the US aren't bad for you. Check your local municipal water's web page, and they should have information on whether or not anything is being added to it that may not sit well with you, flouride for instance is added to some municipal sources.

That being said, some bottled waters bottle their water at municipal sources, i.e. making people pay for tap. So if you are caught in the bottled water mode, check to see just where it is being bottled. You may find out that you are drinking tap water from somewhere else. Also, discarded water bottles account for a large amount of waste in the United States. So if you must, here's a tip: Buy only a few bottles, not the large cases. Then, after consumption, fill them wtih tap and stick them in the fridge. Cold water, anytime! And little or no waste material gets introduced into the environment.

Most of this is relatively common knowledge, but there's an answer. Pepsi and Coke do not have to produce your water for you as well.