I have been buying a few gallons of water each time we go shopping to add to the emergency stockpile. Any better ideas for relativly easy water storage? Any one have experiance with Auqua Blox? Sounds like a great idea,but I dont know anyone in Dallas that carrys them? I dont want to order them online since the shipping would cost as much as the water. Any Ideas?

IMO Aquablox are ok for a vehicle kit or something like that, but silly for significant quantities at home. The usual advice seems to be get some 7 gallon aqua-tainers from REI and fill them with tap water, rotating the water every 6 months. Add a few drops of bleach per gallon to stop stuff from growing in the water. The aqua-tainers are cube shaped, sturdy, and stackable.

For larger quantities you can look into 55 gallon drums, flex tanks (www.aquaflex.net), or other types of above ground or underground tanks or cisterns. There is a dealer on ebay who has a wide selection of plastic tanks up to 10,000 or so gallons. The underground ones in the 500-1500 gallon range seem quite practical. The 500 gallon cistern is a sphere about 5 feet in diameter with an access port on top--just dig a hole in the backyard, install the cistern, and fill it from a hose. I'm in a small urban apartment with no backyard but might put a 60 or 110 gallon aquaflex tank under my bed.

Finally if you have the yard space, you could put in a swimming pool or a small pond as a dual use facility.

I've been doing the same -- have a few one gallon spring water jugs stashed, along with a few flats of the 0.5L bottles.

I tried storing tap water but that just got to be a pain in the butt. Especially trying to rotate it, etc.

Found that the 0.5L bottles work great, plus I drink more water. (A good side benefit.) <img src="/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

I've gotten somewhat opposed to using bottled water for everyday drinking. Besides being expensive it's ridiculously wasteful of fuel (transporting it), petrochemicals (plastic bottles), etc. That industry just shouldn't exist on anything like its current scale. I do find the 0.5l bottles convenient at times and keep a bunch of them in my car and use them as needed, but at home I just drink the tap water which isn't bad where I am. If the tap water were worse I'd put in an RO system rather than drink bottled water all the time. I have a 1 gal jug on the kitchen table (I like room temperature water) which I keep full of tap water for drinking. Letting the water stand in the bottle for a few hours makes it taste a bit better. I seem to drink close to a gallon a day.

I have a bunch of 1 gal jugs of tap water stashed away and haven't been rotating them though I should. 6 months is probably way more frequent rotation than needed. Also, bottled water probably isn't sterilized like aqua-blox, so it too would need rotation almost as much as tap water. Finally, if SHTF, funky tap water that hasn't been rotated in years is probably still cleaner than water from a stream, so treating it with a camping filter should make it safe to drink.

Perhaps a reasonable plan involving aqua-tainers and tap water and rotation would be to fill a bunch of aqua-tainers and then use them as drinking dispensers, cycling through them and refilling them as they get emptied. A family would probably use several a week.

If I were to store bottled water I'd probably get it in those 2.5 gallon rectangular containers, less hassle than larger numbers of smaller bottles. But I worry about their leaking as the weather changes or if the containers are stacked.

One of the problems I have with plastic containers is that eventually they impart a plastic taste to whatever is contained in them. I've used aqua-tainers and lexan and HDPE, and they all eventually do the same thing, especially if there's any sort of chemical already added to the water prior to storage (like bleach).

I figure using what is industry standard for consumable liquid storage is probably the most pallatable, though admittedly not the most convenient. 5 gallon glass carbuoys like the ones that are used for microbrewing beer seem to be a really good storage media. They are easy to disinfect, chemically neutral, and reasonably sturdy. They are heavier, and prone to breakage if dropped. Stainless steel containers do seem to work as well. All those bulk soda pop syrup containers seem to do the job without contaminating the highly corrosive contents. I wonder if those tanks are lined on the inside? I've never seen the anatomy of one.

What about food grade 5 gal buckets? Seems like a good combination of size, cost and some portability...

TRO

I have had water in the original store-bought gallon jugs (sealed), and storage conditions make an incredible difference. As soon as plastic heats up, it seems to start giving a nasty taste to the water.

Around here, people have what they call "fruit rooms", like insulated pantries suitable for foods that have been home canned. I store most of my water there, and it tastes fine.

The weight of glass, plus the breakability factor wouldn't make it useful for many people, esp if they found themselves in an evacuation situation.

The soft drink bottles are P.E.T. plastics, and PET seems to be the best one for water storage. The soft milk bottle types seem (to me) to be the worst.

Sue

Those buckets would have the same plastic-taste issues as any other plastic containers and they're certainly less practical than aqua-tainers (though they might cost less). Glass breaks, and stainless steel sounds horrendously expensive. Best bet is probably plastic and then use a carbon filter to remove any plastic residue if you can.

Hey, I almost forgot one of the best and oldest methods of storing clean water. Glazed pottery works pretty darned good, even though it shares similar characteristics to glass. I remember somewhere reading that the ancient chinese made huge glazed vases that were used for clean water storage (also used for grain storage).

For me the main advantage of shop-bought bottled water is that it's stamped with an expiry date, which is usually a couple of years from the purchase date. I'm not really comfortable with the "stick some bleach in it and it'll be OK for 6 months" approach. Of course, the expiry date is only valid if the bottle is sealed, so I don't attempt to transfer it to any other kind of container for storage.

I buy 0.5l bottles which I find convenient for camping, and 4-packs of 2l bottles which are the cheapest I can find locally. I don't attempt to keep more than a few weeks drinking supply.

At home, I use 5 liters bottles.
Right now, I only have 7 or 8 such plastic bottles, stored in my -dark - basement.

But my stock is not well organized. I have some tidying up (?) to do...
Ideally, I would like to have a stock of 10 bottles at least on hand.
That means having 4 or 5 more, rotating, and buying new ones when only 10 are left.

As you mentioned, the expiration date is more than one, maybe even two years ahead.
So

After the Katrina water rush here in Mississippi, I quit fooling around with soda bottles and bought 10 Aqua-Tainers at Walmart. It's a full month's supply of water for me, my wife, and our dog, and they are easy to store, durable, and the best-reviewed affordable container ($7.97 each).

And it's DONE, in one afternoon. No more asking people for empty bottles, washing, trying to store them in a reasonable amount of space, etc.

10 aquatainers for a month = 70 gallons = less than one gallon/day per "person" counting the dog as 0.5 of a person. I guess that's enough for drinking but don't count on it lasting a month if you wash anything, flush the toilet, etc. If you really want a month worth of water you might look into a cistern or other large tank (like 1000 gallons) or possibly a small swimming pool. Aquatainers are probably the best way to store 70 gallons of water.

Some people already HAVE large storage containers and don't realize or remember them. We're on a well and have the 'aerator' tank. It generally holds 250 gallons. If a hurricane is coming then I hold the float switch up so it fills the tank a lot more. It is outside so I do risk 'losing' it if it gets compromised but we have redundancy. We use that H20 for flushing toilets, washing etc.

Don't forget the water heater....IIRC 40-80 gallons depending on the size of it......

We also have 3 aquatainers (getting more) and in the 'off season' (for hurricanes) we have at least 5 cases of bottled drinking water. I've found that Wwashing the aquatiners and rinsing them well enough to drink from takes A LOT of time and diligence so we just go with bottled for drinking. We use it on a daily basis so it is constantly rotated.

Has anyone tried the Coleman 5 gallon water containers? I've got a few of the aquatainers, but I've heard of some problems with them, plus they're a little too large for me. I'm looking for a good alternative, and this is the closest I've found

Coleman 5 Gallon water container

The only thing i didn't like is the spigot does not store inside the container, so it would be easier for it to break off. But it seems to be a little bit better made than the aquatainers.