Is rain no longer potable?

[goboatingnow]

Originally Posted by Wotname

Well let's consider some context then.

From your posts earlier in the thread it appears you believe rainwater is bad, public water supplies are OK or even good and deep borehole water is best. I presume you believe this because of your past experience.

My experience tells me while some of the public water supplies which comes from deep boreholes is considered potable, it is (at the best) an acquired taste and many prefer rainwater. Some water from deep boreholes is only potable for stock and some is simply undrinkable. Some deep borewater exceeds 70C and that saves having to heat it. That your experience is different does not alter these facts.

Come walk in my shoes (or sail in my boat), drink the water I've drunk and you might not be so sure of your beliefs you have recently stated.

We can likely agree that Guinness makes good use of Liffey water.

Not really the point , repeated public health studies show roof collected rainwater to be contaminated typically with bird execrement and other foreign bodies and the E-coli levels were unacceptably high. This was before small sized water treatment systems were available or affordable

Public water is a much better choice of available as legal standards of quality are in place and proper professional treatment systems.

Deep borehole water was the only practical method for a lot of people around me as the water table is low and the water strata was deep though finding water in Ireland is never difficult. !!!

The problems were people skimp on post treatment and there are few laws or sanctions to ensure the quality of private drinking water.

The problems of dug well contamination was even worse modern farming killed these as a means of acquiring water.

These days with integrated treatment systems suitable for small water systems there no excuse and legal standards are very high. So by and large the modern water is much much better then the stuff fron the 60s. I spend way way too much of my teen years sampling water climbing into reservoirs etc and standing in holes fixing mains water pipes.

Thankfully most people these days in developed countries have left those epochs behind and today enjoy filters and treated water both private or public supplied. Standards are high and maintained. I drink the water here without the slightest concern.

“ my father remained astounded to the day he died that people would buy bottled water !!!”

Our water came from 100 feet down cool as from a fridge , better tasting then san pellegribo , the cattle loved it and caused huge consumption problems.

If you walked my walk you’d seen more water systems , issues and problems to last you 10 lifetimes.

Nothing wrong with roof water collection as long as it’s suitable treated and tested to acceptable public drinking standards. The same can be said for any water collection method.

( you should see the water treatment facilities at St James Gate plant “) ( Guineas drinkers will understand the referEnce )

[Chotu]

Is a bore hole the same thing as a well? Asking as an American who doesn’t know. I tried to Google this.

The house I grew up in had a well. It’s something we call a dug well.

This was a hand dug hole that’s probably about 5 feet wide and not really deep. 30ft (10 meters) deep?

It had concrete rings placed in it to act as a side wall.

It was located on top of a natural spring which filled it. Because it was so small we had to watch out doing laundry and maybe washing a car or something. If you used too much you would empty it out. And you’d have to wait for the spring to fill it back up. This would cause priming issues with the pump. And my parents would get upset.

We never had any kidney stones from this however. Maybe the mineral continent is different in the northeast United States than the areas you guys are discussing? Or maybe a borehole is something different than what I drank from.

Our well was hundreds of feet away from the roads, but I do remember them salting the roads as well as spraying oil down on the roads that were farther away. That was to keep the dust down. And to keep the ice down. I’m sure that didn’t help with the quality of the water. But there was no water testing.

Most people when I was growing up and still in the area I am from use artesian wells. These are small diameter (10-12 inches across) holes drilled by specialty companies. They go down hundreds of feet to the aquifer and are lined with steel casings.

My parents drink out of this now. The water is pretty good. It has kind of a musty taste in my opinion. At least on the land they are now located on. Which is different from the land I grew up on. No kidney stones.

These days, as a traveler, I just drink the tapwater wherever I go and filter it. Except overseas. Then it’s bottled

[goboatingnow]

A borehole well is constructed using a drilling rig and typically lined with steel pipe. Typically a submersible pump is now used lowered down the tube , water treatment plant then added topside

Dug wells have virtually disappeared as it’s very hard to satisfy drinking water legal quality standards from them.

Run of from farm animals is the biggest problem.

Most private wells around be are < 100 feet borehole. There’s 10-20 in a 500 metre radius.

Most places overseas I drink the local water. The Greeks are still surprised

[Chotu]

Interesting!

A bore hole well is known as an artesian well here. They are between 100-200 meters deep. Sometimes more than 400 meters deep. So maybe they are a little bit different than the ones you have. They reach aquifers deep below the bedrock hundreds and hundreds of feet below the surface.



Except we do not typically treat the water that comes out. It comes from aquifers hundreds of feet below ground and is known as some of the cleanest water to drink.

Sometimes they need a pump and sometimes they don’t. It depends on the relative height of the top of the well as compared to the refresh area of the aquifer.

Now I finally know what you are all talking about.

[Wotname]

Much of central Australia gets their water from artesian bores which can go over 1km deep (~3,000') and significant number of them are free flowing (i.e. no mechanical pumps required).

The Birdsville bore water comes to the surface at 98C which is first used to drive a geothermal power station and then after cooling, the water is used for the public water supply. Not that there is a lot public at Birdsville, the town population is 115 and they drink more beer than water.

[RaymondR]

Artesian water in general is safer than surface water because of it's lack of biological contaminants. However in migrating to the reservoir to it's point of extraction artesian water can sometime acquire minerals, such as arsenic, which are harmful to human health.

[El Pinguino]

I'm just in from mustering in the top forty and while out there I got to thinking... ( I'm not sure about bears in the woods but cows and waterways? Yup.

Stuff that poncy Fiji Water, the Chileans should be bottling their bore water and exporting it.

It would help a lot of people to chill out.

https://www.dw.com/en/lithium-extrac...ter/a-51844854

https://www.australianpharmacist.com...mental-health/

[El Pinguino]

Originally Posted by Wotname

Much of central Australia gets their water from artesian bores which can go over 1km deep (~3,000') and significant number of them are free flowing (i.e. no mechanical pumps required).

The Birdsville bore water comes to the surface at 98C which is first used to drive a geothermal power station and then after cooling, the water is used for the public water supply. Not that there is a lot public at Birdsville, the town population is 115 and they drink more beer than water.

I believe that water entered the aquifer in PNG quite some time ago. Or so we were taught in school - quite some time ago.

[StuM]

Originally Posted by Wotname

Not that there is a lot public at Birdsville, the town population is 115

Except on Race Days

[Wotname]

Originally Posted by StuM

Except on Race Days

Yep, once a year for 2 days plus arrival and departure days

[GordMay]

Per-and polyfluoroalkyl ‘forever’ substances (PFAS)

DuPont and 3M knowingly concealed the serious health risks of so-called ‘forever chemicals’ in their products for decades, University of California San Francisco researchers say [1]. Also known as PFAS, the chemicals can be found in everyday products like clothing, household items and food packaging.

Per-and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) are a class of widely-used chemicals that persist in the environment and bioaccumulate in humans and animals, becoming an increasing cause for global concern.

The study [1] highlighted examples of company documents mentioning toxic effects:
- As early as 1970, a DuPont memo said PFOA, a type of PFAS, was "highly toxic when inhaled and moderately toxic when ingested."
- In 1980, DuPont and 3M learned that two pregnant employees involved in PFOA manufacturing had given birth to children with birth defects. Neither company released that information or told employees.
- In 1981, DuPont workers showed elevated levels of liver enzymes.
- In 1994, 3M knew of links of PFAS to prostate cancer that it shared with DuPont, a competitor.

Implications for policy makers
1. This paper analyses how the chemical industry, using industry documents, delayed disclosing the harms of PFAS, costing billions of dollars in health and environmental damages globally.
2. Many countries are pursuing legal and legislative action to curb PFAS production that may be aided by the timeline of evidence presented here.
3. The production of chemical toxicity research should be in the best interest of protecting the public’s health, including designing the research question, funding studies, and publishing favorable and unfavorable findings.
4. Legal settlements against chemical manufacturers should include documents disclosure in order to ensure transparency and accountability for industries and their products.
5. Public health and environmental policy makers should move towards precautionary principles of chemical regulation.

[1] “The Devil they Knew: Chemical Documents Analysis of Industry Influence on PFAS Science” ~ by Nadia Gaber, Lisa Bero, & Tracey J. Woodruff
Peer Reviewed, Open Access ➥ https://annalsofglobalhealth.org/art...5334/aogh.4013


The Canadian government released a draft "State of PFAS" report in May, inviting public comment. The report will inform eventual policies to regulate PFAS, the government said.
Listing a substance as toxic under the Canadian Environmental Protection Act (CEPA) is the first step toward the government enacting regulations to ban it, as Ottawa did with single-use plastic items.
Draft state of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) report
➥ https://www.canada.ca/en/environment...es-report.html

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is set to finalize new rules on PFAS. Several U.S. states have moved on their own to restrict the use of PFAS and keep them out of their water supply.
Key EPA Actions to Address PFAS
➥ https://www.epa.gov/pfas/key-epa-actions-address-pfas

[grantmc]

You know Geordie May I usually really enjoy and welcome your informative posts, particularly scientific. But the stuff about PFAS substances (that I'd never heard of until reading the post) is really awful. I appreciate the post certainly, but kind of wish I hadn't read it.

[donradcliffe]

Originally Posted by GordMay

Per-and polyfluoroalkyl ‘forever’ substances (PFAS)

DuPont and 3M knowingly concealed the serious health risks of so-called ‘forever chemicals’ in their products for decades, University of California San Francisco researchers say [1]. Also known as PFAS, the chemicals can be found in everyday products like clothing, household items and food packaging.

Per-and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) are a class of widely-used chemicals that persist in the environment and bioaccumulate in humans and animals, becoming an increasing cause for global concern.

The study [1] highlighted examples of company documents mentioning toxic effects:
- As early as 1970, a DuPont memo said PFOA, a type of PFAS, was "highly toxic when inhaled and moderately toxic when ingested."
- In 1980, DuPont and 3M learned that two pregnant employees involved in PFOA manufacturing had given birth to children with birth defects. Neither company released that information or told employees.

This is another example of what happens when lawyers and politicians get involved.

Do you have any idea of how many children are born with birth defects on average? Its about 1 in live 30 births. How many PFOA employees had normal births? How many birth defects were there among non PFOA employees?

[Nautes]

My household has distilled its own water for drinking and cooking for a few years now. That's the safest way. You should see the stuff at the bottom of the pot when it has run its cycle. Megahome makes a good unit-takes about 4-5 hours to distill one gallon. We have two. I would definitely distill the rainwater.

[Nautes]

If you want to understand why modern peoples get caries when the ancients did not, read this book:

https://www.amazon.com/Nutrition-Phy...5810051&sr=8-1