How to buy an effective countertop water filter system
It's not always easy to know what's in your tap water. To get around this, many people buy bottled water to drink instead of drinking it out of their home taps. However, this can be costly not just for your wallet, but for the environment as well. This is where a countertop drinking water filter system can help you.
Now, you might be thinking that because you recycle water bottles for your drinking water, you're doing everything you can to help the environment. But that's not so. When you recycle, it's certainly true that you're helping the environment versus if you would simply throw your water bottles away.
However, when you recycle, that recycled product is still going to take some energy to clean, reformulate into another product, and use again. Therefore, it's best to follow the adage, "Reduce, reuse, and recycle," with "reduce and reuse" first on the list as they should be. When you reduce and reuse, you are extending the useful life of something, which eliminates recycling or waste costs associated with it.This is where a countertop water filter comes in handy. Instead of buying bottled water to drink, you can buy sturdy, washable and reusable water bottles for your family, and then fill them with filtered water from your own tap. This saves money, saves recycling costs both in money and energy use, and keeps yet more garbage out of the landfill, for those who don't recycle.
Buying a countertop filter is relatively easy. You want one that will filter the water based upon your needs. For example, if you live in an area with particularly bad tasting water, such as with high sulfur or iron content, you're going to want a filter that will get all of the impurities out. Check with your local municipality to determine the quality of your current tap water. (Of course, you probably already know whether or not it tastes good.)
Most countertop filtration systems are two-stage, although you can buy those that are reverse osmosis if your water is particularly bad and needs extensive filtration. These systems hook up directly to your water faucet for simpler models, or can be hooked up directly under your sink to access the water source directly. With a two-stage filter system, the system usually filters out particulates and such as lead, some parasites, various contaminants, and then filters for taste through a charcoal filter as its final stage. These filters are meant to be used with water that is already safely drinkable but simply needs some purification to make it taste better. For water that is truly not drinkable, you can buy countertop filter systems that utilize reverse osmosis, as stated above, and make your water truly healthy to drink.
Look for countertop water filter systems online. Here, you can research various brands and type in a particular model along with the word "complaint" or "review" to determine whether there have been any complaints against a particular brand of countertop water filter system, or whether it has gotten particularly good reviews, for example. It's also a good idea to shop online for your countertop water filter system because you'll generally get the best and most competitive prices this way. In many cases, you can also get free shipping, which means you have the convenience of having your drinking water filters system brought right to your door.
If you are so inclined, you can also check with one of your local water treatment companies and rent a system from them. In this case, you'll get home installation and service, and perhaps even filters included with your monthly service fee. In some cases, this is a much better deal than buying your own countertop water filter system.
Whatever you choose to do, you can have clean and healthy "bottled" water that you don't actually have to buy, but can get from your own tap at home. This is both the most environmentally conscious and frugal thing to do.
