How much bleach are you planning to add to keep the water out of contamination? I have heard different versions, from 1 to 4 drops per litter.
Is there any other option, based on common house hold products?
Thanks + Regards

I use a combination system to have as much flexibility as possible. I have several 5 gallon containers that I keep full and change out the water every 6 months or so. I also buy 1 gallon “milk” type jugs of drinking water from the supermarket that I normally drink my water out of and I also keep a few of the 20 oz bottles that are easy to handle and are tough enough to carry around with out leaking. I also use my old soda and juice bottles to keep about 20 gallons frozen in my deep freezer which gives me water as well as keep my freezer cold longer during power outages and makes it cheaper to run day to day.

Just to throw in my two cents, take a look at the thread I started:

Water storage question: Will cheaper work?

Hope this helps.

-- Craig

Is this for sheltering in place?

We have two bathtubs that we fill for flushing the toilet and washing. We have two 5-gallon water jugs for drinking water and several water bottles.

Can part of your 30 gallons be in your bathtub?

I'm assuming you're thinking of a scenario where your well/city water supply has failed, and you're staying in your home until the situation has returned to normal. If that's the case, you probably already have a 40+ gallon water supply: The hot water heater. (If you have an on-demand hot water system, then of course this isn't a solution.) Assuming the hot water heater is strapped down to prevent it from being damaged during an event, you've got plenty of potable water ready to go.

Be sure to test this, as many tubs will not hold water forever. Mine loses about 50% over night and would not be something to count on for longer than that. I guess it all goes back to test what you use before you need it.
Arrrr! Now I’m going to have to do another dry run with the generator since I changed up some things with it last week.

Sheepdog,

Good point!

I'll have to make sure we have the rubber disks you place over the drains to keep the water from seeping out.

Thanks!

Give the bottles a hot water rinse... if you're really worried, use a dilute bleach/water bath. I've stored and later (several months later) used water using just a simple hot water rinse SEVeral times with no ill effect.

Troy

If you might possibly have small, relatively weak people dispensing the water, don't use the largest containers unless they've got spigots.

And you might have a couple of gallons in the toilet tank, too.

If you're using city water, there's probably enough chlorine in it that you don't need to add extra.

Sue

I'm wondering if anyone has any experience with something like the 65 gallon tank on this page?

When looking at earthquake prep in our area and then looking at what happened with Katrina, I was thinking it would be nice to have 50-60 gallons of water.

When you look at storing that amount of water in small containers, it starts to get a bit challenging, esp. in regards to rotation and maint.

So, what I'm thinking about now, is a two prong approach. A large container with a fair amount of water (see tank) and then some number of smaller, portable containers.

The idea is that the large container should be easy to maintain - you could drain and re-fill very quickly and you don't have a bunch of containers to deal with. With the larger container, you don't need as many smaller containers so less work. They act as a backup in case anything happens to the larger container and are portable.

The gotcha is that I'm not really that familar with this type of container.

Thoughts?

Thanks,

-john