Water Debate. Can it go bad?

Okay, here's another one. I was at a disaster prep meeting that my local town hosted this afternoon. Not particularly helpful, but the person from the health department started talking about water going bad, and when I pressed her on it, she basically punted.

So, let's say I've got clean water I store in a 50-gallon barrel. I've got 2, actually. They're in my basement. Can this water "go bad"? The basement can get a bit damp in the summer, but I run a dehumidfier. If it still looks clean and smells clean, how long can I store it before changing it out? 1 year? 5 years?

What about water in the 1-gallon jugs you buy at the store?

Thoughts?

Tap water does contains some bacteria, the water treatment plant puts in just enough anti-bacterial agent that the water is going to be within their specification only for the time it takes to get to your tap. They aim to put the minimum amount of treatment agent in because it costs money and people don't like it.

Bottled water is generally just tap water filtered to remove some minerals, it's not generally treated to remove any more bacteria and the extra handling steps could introduce more.
On the other hand it is sealed in a reasonably clean factory - unlike you filling a 50 gallon drum with a hose pipe and your dirty hands. Gallon jug bottles of water are also easier to handle and are consumed faster when opened than a 50Gal drum.

The advice used to be to add 1/2 teaspoon/5 gallon of chlorine bleach to stored water. Probably can't do any harm.

After a few years the stored tap water might have some bugs in it, but it isn't likely to suddenly contain cholera, polio, typhoid or a bunch of parasites so it's still better than the water supply for most of the world.

I have one of those blue 50 gallon drums with water in it. In my last place I kept it in my garage up on blocks, to keep it away from the concrete floor. I had it stored there for 8-9 years without changing it. When we filled it up initially with a garden hose, we included 1 cup of bleach. That was the amount we had heard at the time and it seems like a bit much. But when it came time to move, I had to siphon it out. It didn't taste the best but I didn't get sick either. I suspect if it was oxigenated by pooring it back and fourth, it would help quite a bit. I also have drink mix for this purpose.

I don't know if I would leave it forever, but I personally don't think 5-10 years is a big deal if your source is reasonably clean, your storage container is sanitized, and you add some bleach.

My .02.

Nobody Special had the right amounts for chlorine to water. 1 tsp per 10 gallons. Just found this link.

http://www.doh.wa.gov/phepr/handbook/purify.htm

If city water is used and properly stored in an air tight container it will not "go bad". It will however over time go "flat". Before drinking if you want it to taste more normal shake it up in a bottle and then poor and enjoy.

Well water on the other hand may taste weird or different but it still won't go bad... this is all dependent upon the type of water coming from your well, if it's filtered, hardened, softened, etc, etc.

Also, keep in mind you can just boil the water if you think it may have gone "bad"...

The only way I know of to sterilize/decontaminate water and store it thus indefinitely is to use a reflux distillation process and drain the condensed water directly into sterilized/decontaminated glass containers. Done right, the distilled water can be stored indefinitely (or at least till the glass bottle wears out, let's say a practical limit of 500 years). The whole distillation/bottling process would need to be hermetically sealed.

Another way to store water indefinitely would be to freeze it. It won't eliminate pre-existing contaminants, but if you freeze it and put it in a sealed container, it should stay viable for a very long time.

I store rain water in the basement for my house plants and Bonsai. In the winter I use that water for house plants, but in the summer it's a backup to the outdoor one under a down-spout. It gets stinky after awhile so I'd change it out periodically. But recently I got the idea to try putting an aquarium filter in it. It works like a champ, the water stays fresh all winter. It has an aerating capability too, if I set it at just the right height it will suck air from the surface and blow bubbles. I wouldn't feel bad about using that as drinking water in a pinch.

When people speak of storing water and having it 'go bad', all we're talking about is bacterial growth, right? I am assuming that if the water was good to drink when it was put into storage, other contaminants were eliminated before storage.

It seems that if you are using municipal water, you should be able to ask for a copy of the test results. I belong to a local water association which mails out the test results twice a year. This is a pretty complete test, not just bacteria.

If you are using well water, it would probably be a good idea to get a full test done occasionally. It isn't cheap, but it would be good to know. It might also be useful to find out what kind of water source you're tapped into. I guess sometimes it's a true aquifer, and sometimes it's just groundwater. Contamination with manure nitrates and farm and industrial chemicals are more likely with some than others. And don't forget all the lawn and yard chemicals that are transported into your water supply. Not to mention dumped petroleum products, flushed medications, and a host of other contaminants.

It would be interesting to store your water for ten years or so, and open a bottle every year and have it tested for bacteria (it's usually about $10 around here). Of course, if you ran into problems early on, you would know not to try to store it past that point.

Exposure to elevated temperatures might also affect bacterial counts.

We are going to have our well water re-tested.
We are doing one outside @ the well and one inside the house.

I want to see if the pipes corroding are doing anything to my water too. Keep that in mind depending where you fill up on any system... old systems may put lead in the water.

They aren't eliminated they are just reduced to an acceptable level. The treatment plant looks at how much bacteria there are in the water and reduces them to a percentage where it would take say 30days for the survivors to increase to a level that exceeds their specifications (which still isn't necessarily dangerous) if they think that it takes less than 30 days for the water in their pipes to reach the consumer and be used - it is safe.

The bacteria load in stored water will depend on the number of bacteria left after the treatment process, the temperature (which affects their reproduction rate) the level of nutrients in the water (for them to feed on) and any toxins (either from the original treatment or that you have added).

The most likely source of bacteria in stored water is contamination from you handling and filling it.

My containers are all under 6 gallons. I rotate through this stock around six-nine months. Not a problem. but I do use filtered water and aerate before use.

I don't know if you are aware or not, but you may want to check your state's regulations regarding capture/storage of rainwater. Here in Colorado it is unlawful.

Even for capture and release ;-)

I've had bottled water that tasted like the plastic bottle after just a few months.

Illegal? Really?

Thats absurd. But wasn't it Colorado that squashed an Oil Shale project that would have provided us as much oil as there is in the middle east because the state demanded an obscene amount of money for the use of the Colorado river made the costs prohibitive?

I read somewhere that a guy got half a dozen discarded water heaters for free and connected them in series to the water supply line for his house.

If he ever lost city water pressure, he had something like 400 gallons of nice fresh water on hand. No muss, no fuss.

"It's Now Legal to Catch a Raindrop in Colorado" - New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/29/us/29rain.html?_r=1&ref=todayspaper

"For the first time since territorial days, rain will be free for the catching here... Here in Colorado, the old law created a kind of wink-and-nod shadow economy. Rain equipment could be legally sold, but retailers said they knew better than to ask what the buyer intended to do with the product... State water officials acknowledged that they rarely enforced the old law... But Kevin Rein, Colorado’s assistant state engineer, said enforcement would focus on people who violated water rules on a large scale... A study in 2007 proved crucial to convincing Colorado lawmakers that rain catching would not rob water owners of their rights. It found that in an average year, 97 percent of the precipitation that fell in Douglas County, near Denver, never got anywhere near a stream. The water evaporated or was used by plants."

Reading that article, I discovered that it is illegal to catch rainwater here in WA, and in ID, also. But that will probably change, too.

Well, you learn something every day! It never occurred to me that catching and storing rain water could be considered a crime, but I suppose it makes some kind of sense in very arid areas. Are there special "Rainwater Police" who enforce this, and what are the consequences if you are caught with a barrel of rainwater?

Who owns the rain? Individuals, society at large, privately held water bottling companies?

State and local municipalities own the water, and code enforcement officers who are always driving around town inspecting properties for code violations usually do the enforcement. The consequences are confiscation of equipment and a fine.

It also depends on water demands in an area. Even though the Douglas County model demonstrated non-significance, I am sure if there was another region in the state that could demonstrate otherwise and wanted to push the issue, the regulation would be back on the books, at least for part of the state. In Queensland AU, it was a pretty hefty fine if you were caught sequestering rain water, and enforcement at the time was pretty diligent. They were in a dire situation there, though. Idaho might be convinced to drop the regulation, but as long as you've got commie liberals running the show in Washington, I wouldn't ever expect the law there to get repealed.

Yep! It's ridiculous.

"commie liberals" as opposed to what, PHRASECENSOREDPOSTERSHOULDKNOWBETTER. Conservatives?

And thus ends another thread for me.

If we're gonna start censoring the word "PHRASECENSOREDPOSTERSHOULDKNOWBETTER." then we damn well better start censoring the word "commie" when it's applied to our legally elected administration.

To do otherwise is not only illogical, it is hypocrisy at it's finest.

Unbelievable, let me try this again since I don't know better.

If we're going to censor the word f-a-s-c-i-s-t, then start censoring the word "commie".

Blast enters, cocks an eyebrow at Ben, then gives a meaningful glance towards the naughty corner.

-Blast

If the water is sterile to start with and is in sealed sterile food safe containers it will not go bad.
If the water is in open containers or has living algae or bacteria in it they will grow, especially if there is anything in the water to feed them. Most algae only need basic minerals and sunlight.
So chlorinate your clean water before storing it or sterilize it with heat just like you were canning it.
Another thing that can happen is if the container leaches chemicals into the water, but that should not be a worry if the container is a food safe container.

Water can pick up scents from around it through plastics. After a while it might smell like a musty basement if you are storing it in a musty basement, or like oil if you are storing it near fuel.

Chlorine will eventually gas off even if the water is in a sealed plastic container but it will already have killed any pathogens that might have been in the water or container. That means the water would have to be contaminated from an outside source and so long as the container is still sealed the water will not be contaminated.
Even if the water did get contaminated by algae or bacteria your basic water treatment, chemical or boiling, would make it safe again.

However you will find recommendations all over the place to replace your water supply every 6 months from all sorts of experts. I have not found any of these expert opinions which are backed up by any research.

Actually it sounds like y'all are blaming the wrong end of the political spectrum. Most of the water rules for distribution were written by politically connected ranchers and farmers, sometimes miners, to protect the financial interests of their industry back in the 18 and 1900s.

The rules divided up every gallon that flows down the watershed. The way the rules, some dating back to the 1800s, were written any retention of water on a person's property was seen as theft of water rights from the parties downstream. These rules were written a long time before the term environmentalism was coined.

Back when 'Whiskey's for drinking and water's for fighting over' pretty much explained it. It was all about water rights as a way of exerting control over business rivals. There were several brush fire wars fought over water rights as large ranchers, often with ranches the size of counties, and farmers consolidated their holdings and ran smaller outfits out of business.

You can complain about some liberal input into how the water is divided up presently. Environmental rules give the wildlife and fishes a cut they didn't get before, but the custom of having rules banning collecting water, including rainfall, predate the environmentalists by a very long time. The rules were ostensibly intended to keep people from damming large flows for commercial use but water rights were weapons. Often weapons of spite so the sloppy wording that technically bans running a rain gutter to a barrel may have been intentional.

Of course nobody in a very long time has been prosecuted for collecting rainwater according to an article I read. There are several businesses in the SW, one of which is run by an old hippie, that specialize in rainwater collection systems despite their entire business model being in violation of the law.

Ideally you could work toward getting the law changed. But if your just figuring to cast blame you need to direct your ire at a bunch of rich and politically connected farmers and ranchers who ran things a long time ago. Hippies and tree huggers had nothing to do with it.

They just legalized it in CO.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/29/us/29r...ater&st=cse

Okay, I had to take the day off today to go be in the naughty corner. No more colorful adjectives. At $60 an hour, that little stunt cost me.

Anyone want to bail me out of the naughty corner yet? The wife says she's going to the bar tonight, and since I can't go (stuck in the naughty corner) she's making it a lady's night out.

Don't let this happen to you. Keep it clean, keep the politics out of it.

Ben, who is tired of wearing the pointy cone hat...

You weren't alone in your misdeeds. I noticed a decided leaning of your antagonist in more than just his thread.

Take the hat off. I need my traffic cone back.

Much as I dislike bunny-huggers and tree-****ers, I have to admit that here, in Aridzona, most of the push to get rainwater collection systems to be common-place is from the more leftist leaning bunch. I know of whole subdivisions in some areas of the state, without accesable aquifers for well water, which require each home to have rainwater collection systems.
They make sense, no mater where you live. Sorry about those states with antique water laws. Of course, there are several ongoing litigations over water rights here in State and Federal courts. Ah me oh my. What a place.
By the way, thanks to whomever is responsible for my upgrade. I just noticed I'm a "journeyman".

Here in the UK I store water in a cistern in the roof space.
This holds about 200 litres, and is filled with city water automaticly by a float valve as used in a lavatory flush cistern.

An outlet is fitted near the top of the cistern, and this water is used normally for laundry and toilet flushing.
Any interuption in the water supply, would result in the water level in the cistern dropping below the upper outlet, thereby preventing any more water being used for low priority uses.

A second outlet is fitted near the bottom of the cistern, and is connected via microbore copper tube to a water tap in a conclealed place.
The concealement prevents anyone from borrowing, useing, stealing, or requistioning the water.

The reserve capacity is about 150 litres, or enough for drinking for a month or two.
The cistern is kept vlean and has a tight fitting lid, therefore the water should be fit to drink, though I keep chlorine tablets as a second line of defense.

They are generally to protect the water supply for places downstream.
If Colarado carefully collected all it's rainwater, sprayed it onto golf course and let it evaporate then California would be in trouble.

It always cracks me up to hear about water "usage". Nobody takes water. We just borrow it for a little while...

I had a salesman try to sell me on a very expensive washing machine that only used 2 oz of water for a full load. Ok, maybe a slight exaggeration... But my point was that my washer is on the same drain line as a toilet, far away from the "central" line, so I wanted one that used a lot of water to keep my line clean, just in case. He wasn't sure what to say about that.

I also told him that the quicker we used it, the quicker we returned it to the hydrological cycle, and the quicker it would come back to us. Circle of life kind of thing... I like playing with salesmen...

There's the same amount of water now as there has ever been for the most part, it's just in different places and under different people's control and that's the crux of the matter.

For the most part, this is true. The amount of water fluctuates regularly as it is ionized by various methods (including ambient UV in daylight) into H2 and O2, then recombined in combustion and other catylistic processes. I'd estimate the fluctuation to be somewhere around +/- 100,000 gallons per 24 hour period. But I could be off by an order of magnitude.