EP: Question about water storage

[wildflower]

I have heard not to store water in plastic containers for long. Why is this? How do each of you store water, and for how long?

(I preceded the title with "EP" for "Emergency Preparedness" as suggested in another thread.)

[akwapez]

1. I store in plastic containers

I suppose there could be concern with some plastics with chemicals leeching into the water. I think if you are storing in food grade plastic bottles and keeping out of the sunlight, you should be fine. Make sure you don't use containers that previous held any toxic material no matter how clean you think it is. For long-term storage, bleach can be added. I believe this is 4 drops per gallon, but since too much bleach is harmful, please check on that yourself.

[silverweb]

2. Thanks for starting with EP... it works!

For water storage, I think the advice to not store it in plastic depends on the type of plastic. Some plastics are known to leach nasty chemicals into even just water.

Several years ago, I purchased four 3-gallon water bottles that are made of a type of plastic especially designed for storing water. I have a counter-top ceramic water dispenser and simply keep the bottles in rotation, rinsing each thoroughly before refilling it with filtered water.

If you don't normally use filtered water and have bottles only for an emergency, I'd just suggest using the water, rinsing, and refilling the bottles with fresh water every 4-6 months or so.

[ancient_nomad]

3. I use empty cleaned gallon milk containers,

and add 8 drops of regular clorox per gallon. I rotate them every 6 months or so, for use in an emergency.

[wildflower]

4. Why do you rotate them?

This is what I'm wondering. Is it because chemicals from plastic can leak into the water, as akwapez said above?

[ancient_nomad]

5. I rotate them as I want to have fresh water....

in them every 6 months or so. Sometimes mold grows around the lid, so I use a new, washed container also. As far as the plastic milk jugs, I think they are fairly safe. But, these days, who knows!:shrug:

[kestrel91316]

6. I have a 15 gallon blue barrel for water storage at the clinic.

I bought it at a knife/emergency prep shop here in the neighborhood.

After the Northridge quake we had a boil order for a week or so and with no easy way to boil there I was reduced to schlepping empty jugs and pots down the street to the National Guard water truck positioned at the high school. Now I won't have to fret about potable water for a few days if anything happens.

I used to have a 30 gallon barrel at the house (in the garage) also. I should get a 15 gal for the balcony at my apartment - no room for it inside.

[benEzra]

7. Our city water is lousy (heavily chlorinated), so we picked up a water dispenser a few years ago

something like this:



The upside of that is, it makes it easy to store extra water (by buying extra bottles) and dispense it conveniently. We live in hurricane country, so it's helped us through water outages a couple of times.

Water prices out at around a dollar a gallon that way, though you'll pay a deposit on your bottles when you are first getting set up. Some places (Culligan) offer home water delivery, but we don't go through enough water for that to be necessary.

Just be sure to rotate what you keep on hand.

[murray hill farm]

8. These bottles are recycled...

which helps to feel OK about using them, rather than the small ones. I refill mine at a local grocery store, which uses the bottle u came in with and refills the bottle for 30 cents a gallon. I do wash with a chlorine solution before each refill. Check your local stores for one of the refill machines.

[happyslug]

9. True at one time, but NOT the case in the plastics used since the 1970s

Some of the earlier plastics would "leak" some of the plastics into any water the plastic was holding and you could taste it. Most such "leaks" were solved by the 1960s when even the US Army switched from stainless Steel Canteens to Plastic Canteens. The alcohol industry took longer, they did not start using plastics till the 1980s (With milk and water about the same time). Glass is still considered a more impregnable bottle, but plastics today are so close people can NOT tell the difference.

Another case of what was true at one time (1940s till the 1960s) is no longer true, but the old rule is still heard. This is similar to the old stories about Syphilis, if it was caught before it penetrated the water barrier around the brain (At about three months) Sulfa drugs and penicillin could cure it, but if syphilis did penetrate the the water barrier all these drugs could do was arrest it so you could NOT transmit it and stop most physical restrictions, but the well known mental problems that came with syphilis would still occur. I heard these stories as late as the 1970s, 20 years after Tetracycline was introduced (c1954) and its ability to penetrate the Brain water barrier and eliminate syphilis even in the brain. Old stories die hard, especially if true at one time (Even if no longer true). The same with Plastics NOT being used for long term water storage, not true since about the 1970s, but since it was true in the 1940s, 1950s and 1960s, the stories that water should NOT be stored in plastics are still heard and repeated.

[hippywife]

10. I'm not so sure about that.

There are still plenty of issues it seems with BPA containers.