Anyone know much about drinking water and contaminants?

[Nabbit]

A new study came out recently about GA + our county (DeKalb) tap water having high levels of cancer-causing contaminants.

https://www.ewg.org/tapwater/system.php?pws=GA0890001

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/c...found-in-gas-drinking-water-report/ar-AAJecIT

We usually use a Pur water filter (https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07CRSK5KX/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1) but per the EWG site, it does not remove most of these contaminants. The study and EWG website says reverse osmosis is the only system that would remove most of these contaminants.

This seems like a filtration system that is reasonably priced and well-reviewed. This is just one we were looking at.

https://www.amazon.com/APEC-5-Stage-Reverse-Drinking-Water/dp/B00I0ZGOZM?ref_=fsclp_pl_dp_2

But, do we need one? When we told our landlord about our interested in installing a reverse osmosis filter, they said they've read the annual water quality report for DeKalb and recommended we read it. They said that EWG is a lobbying group for organic companies and recommended Googling "who funds EWG" and looking up Stone Mountain Georgia water quality report. They said they're open to our thoughts, though.

Here's the DeKalb drinking water report from 2019 (2 page PDF).

https://www.dekalbcountyga.gov/sites/default/files/users/user3551/2019 CCR Web Version.pdf

And here's a report on surface and groundwater report from 2015:

https://epd.georgia.gov/sites/epd.g...e/GAEPD Water Quality Monitoring Strategy.pdf

I don't know what to make of all of this, really. The EWG report makes it sound like there are serious contaminants in our water and that reverse osmosis is the way to go. Is it fearmongering or overblowing the situation, though? I don't want to invest in this unnecessarily if that's the case and if a Pur filter is sufficient.

Thanks all for your time and for any thoughts you can share!

 

[nsilvias]

the only thing i know is that in chicago if you let the tap water sit for too long it starts to taste really bad. most likely all those chemicals

 

[Nabbit]

Bumping this in the hope someone knows about this stuff. Nivash, you know a lot about a lot of things, any chance this is one of them? :)

 

[Nabbit]

Anyone? ...Bueller?

 

[ElectricBlanketFire]

When did you move from Vermont Max?

 

[Deleted member 24079]

I did some research after looking in to pfas contaminates. I found that I live near a large pfas site. Thankfully our water source for the area is from Detroit which is clean. Our soil just isn't great. Anyways reverse osmosis is a great way to go. I can't cite any sources but those looking in to pfas found it did the most to remove it.

 

[Nabbit]

When did you move from Vermont Max?

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2015! Time flies, eh?

I did some research after looking in to pfas contaminates. I found that I live near a large pfas site. Thankfully our water source for the area is from Detroit which is clean. Our soil just isn't great. Anyways reverse osmosis is a great way to go. I can't cite any sources but those looking in to pfas found it did the most to remove it.

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Thanks for the info! I really appreciate it.

 

[Nivash]

Bumping this in the hope someone knows about this stuff. Nivash, you know a lot about a lot of things, any chance this is one of them? :)

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Thanks for the confidence! This isn't really in my wheelhouse though so I'm not much help. I also have no idea whether or not a reverse osmosis filter would be much help either. If I had to hazard a guess, it's probably not that much of an issue if it's within legal limits but yeah. It would be nice to have a third, unbiased source but the question might be a bit niche.

 

[Bear]

I thought the EWG was complete bullshit? They have the same reports about water in my area (outside of NYC). I wouldn't take it seriously.

 

[Lafazar]

From what I'm reading about the EWG, I don't get the feeling, that they fully adhere to scientific reasoning and are prone to fearmongering:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_Working_Group

https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Environmental_Working_Group

the only thing i know is that in chicago if you let the tap water sit for too long it starts to taste really bad. most likely all those chemicals

Click to shrink...

This is completely normal:

 

[ruggiex]

It just depends on your comfort level really. I mean if there's real issue, you aren't going to find out until it's too late. So on one hand you could say it's better to be safe than sorry. On the other, you could be just wasting money because the containment isn't bad enough for it to matter. I have filters at home that will remove most of things though not quite as much as a reverse osmosis system, but I don't have problem drinking tap water when I'm not home (except for places where it's not safe to do so).

 

[TheHunter]

Anyone? ...Bueller?

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Class A Water Treatment operator reporting and yes, if you do infact have THMs, Radeon/radium gas or other carcinogins you either need a RO system to properly remove them or have your city build a lime treatment or RO plant.

Lots of CL2 can help but might create other carginogins in the process.


Levels also matter.

 

[Nabbit]

Thanks so much all for your thoughtful replies.

I thought the EWG was complete bullshit? They have the same reports about water in my area (outside of NYC). I wouldn't take it seriously.

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Thanks man. Can you link me to some source(s) about it being BS? Sincerely asking.

 

[Nabbit]

Class A Water Treatment operator reporting and yes, if you do infact have THMs, Radeon/radium gas or other carcinogins you either need a RO system to properly remove them or have your city build a lime treatment or RO plant.

Lots of CL2 can help but might create other carginogins in the process.


Levels also matter.

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Thank you very much! Can you tell from the pages I linked if the contaminants in my area water fall into any of those categories?

 

[Bear]

Thanks so much all for your thoughtful replies.


Thanks man. Can you link me to some source(s) about it being BS? Sincerely asking.

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That thought is so pervasive that it's even on its Wiki page: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_Working_Group

 

[TheHunter]

Thank you very much! Can you tell from the pages I linked if the contaminants in my area water fall into any of those categories?

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I look into it when I get home.

Warning, some states have more stringent standards so it may not be a 1 to 1.

 

[Tezz]

I've seen several carbon copies of that article, "Cancer-Linked Contaminants Found In ____'s Drinking Water" all with the same stock image and identical bullet pointed list. My family was concerned about our city's water, so I tried to look into it. I was really skeptical when I saw the EWG site, especially when it looks like it's heavily advertising water filter systems.

 

[Anustart]

Put some potatoes in your socks while you sleep. It will extract the contaminants.

 

[_Karooo]

Umm don't you have an RO + UV water filter?

 

[Septimus Prime]

One thing to keep in mind is that RO will also filter out fluoride, which could be bad if you have kids who are still growing teeth.

 

[Hesemonni]

Sometimes I forget that there's a country in the western world where you have to filter tap water to not actually die from drinking it.

And people are not rioting over it.

 

[SMD]

.

 

[Tezz]

I'm on mobile so only skimmed the article but when it says the levels of those pollutants were above health guidelines, what do they mean? Are they talking about the US EPA or WHO or what? I didn't see their basis for making these claims.

Also when they say above health guidelines, are they referring to chronic or acute?

Home RO filters seem overkill, is this an American thing?

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The health guidelines referred to are those of the organization alleging the levels are unsafe, in contradiction of the EPA. The warnings themselves are vague, "linked to an increased risk of cancer".

 

[SMD]

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[Tezz]

How are they guidelines then? I was expecting some kind of governing body or authority cited. Any medical research?

I mean, in theory anything can be harmful depending on the concentration but at the same time you don't want drinking water to be expensive cos you're essentially piping deionised water to homes.

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I'm not sure, but claims of cancer risk have become cues for me to tune out. Just as you were expressing, it's the dosage that makes a poison. This group, the EWG, doesn't seem to have good methodology. While not water related, they have another project about pesticide levels in foods. This study for instance explains that EWG's methodology "does not appear to follow any established scientific procedures". So I'm not exactly jumping to buy the reverse osmosis system they're heavily recommending.

 

[SMD]

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[brawndolicious]

Disclosure: I'm a Water Quality program manager at a major California utility.

First let me explain the PHG and MCL.

• MCL is the Maximum Contaminant Level, this is essentially the legal limit for the level of contaminant that is acceptable to deliver to your customer. For copper, it would be 1.3 PPM (parts per million) while for PCE it would be 5 PPB (parts per billion). The MCL for each contaminant is developed by studying the likelihood of developing cancer (or any other health complication) after long-term exposure. Simply, it means that if you drank a couple liters of water right at the MCL for 80 years, you would have a 1 in 300,000 or so chance of developing cancer or kidney problems or whatever it is that the contaminant damages. For some MCLs, it might be 1/200,000 chance, or one in a million, etc. It varies and is an average across the population.
• PHG is the Public Health Goal which is the level at which absolutely no adverse affects could be detected in the population after lifelong exposure. This is often below the level laboratory methods can detect but it's just meant to be a goal, not the requirement.

Now with the EWG website, they make a big stink about the PHG rather than the MCL. If the water was above the MCL, the utility is required to inform their customers that their water is not suitable for drinking but I've only heard of that happening to tiny rural villages in California, where essentially they don't have the money to filter their water after decades of now-banned pesticides being sprayed.

I'm personally suspicious of the EWG website because they make a big push for selling home water filters rather than pushing on either the legislators or the utilities. I don't know if it's kick backs or what, but it just smells like bullshit when politicians and utility companies make themselves easy targets.

My own job is focused on new treatment projects so I literally get paid by people being afraid of what's in their water. But, the most infuriating thing about this EWG website is that for a major treatment project I worked on (regarding the contaminant TCP), they're only displaying the levels in the raw water. Not the fucking treated effluent that goes through humongous filters and gets delivered to the customers tap. Below is the example with TCP in one water system I worked on:

The actual raw level of the filter effluent is UNDER 1.5 PPT (that's as low as the lab instruments can detect). The MCL is 5 PPT. The "EWG Health Guideline" is based on WAY outdated 2009 PHG guideline. The actual PHG is zero because they don't have a laboratory method to test low enough so the current practice is to replace filters as soon as there is a detection. I have every bias in the world but I would suggest looking up your water system on the SDWIS or EPA portal for your state.

This looks like the page for Dekalb county water:

https://ofmpub.epa.gov/enviro/sdw_r...rce=Surface water&population=743000&sys_num=0

Usually there's a page where you can look up all the monitoring results within the last 50 years but I can't find it on that page. The summary seems to say that they've never had any exceedances/violations so that's actually pretty impressive for a water system that size (~700k population). I would recommend getting all the effluent data you can and exporting it to excel to file through.

Obviously, I am potentially a person with a lot of bias. There can be a lot of debate about what "safe" levels of contaminants are but I would recommend doing research through the publicly available monitoring data as well as looking at peer-reviewed scientific studies. Often, it can take several years after there's a scientific consensus before the law gets updated but it's good to learn how to use these resources both for environmental stuff and other scientific things, it's not super accessible for the general public to know what is snake oil and what is real.

 

[TheHunter]

Listen to brawndo. He said what I was gonna say.

I didn't read the article you linked in haste to answer you but if you're not hitting MCLs you're good.

brawndolicious you work at a plant or just with one?