Multipure Aquaversa (MP750sb) Is Recommended By Reactual As Best Under Counter Drinking Water Filter Of The Year For 2012!

April 25th, 2012
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The Best Water Filters For 2012

by  on JANUARY 2, 2012 · in HOME & GARDEN PRODUCTS, KITCHEN PRODUCTS

In A Nutshell: Best Budget Water Filters

Faucet-mounted and pitcher-style filters do not filter water particularly well. Based on our research, we recommend a countertop water filter, such as the ones produced by Multi-Pure. A good budget choice is the high-rated Tap Master Jr. Countertop Water Filter which sells for $100.

If you prefer a filter that doesn’t require installation, you can get a countertop drip filter, and we recommend the British Berkeley brand. Drip filters are used all across the world to filter water from questionable sources.

In A Nutshell: The Best Under-Sink Water Filter

We recommend the Multi-Pure MP750SB under-sink water filter. It is Consumer Reports’ top rated under-sink filter, with a rating of 90 out of 100. It has a wide range of NSF Standard 53 contaminant reduction (NSF is an industry-standard filter certifier). The yearly maintenance costs are also low, making it good value for money in terms of the Cost Per Contaminant (CPC) Ratio. Another excellent filter is the Aqua-Pure by Cuno AP-DWS1000, scoring 88 out of 100 from Consumer Reports, also certified by NSF. It sells for around $100 less than the Multi-Pure filter.

Why Filter Your Water?

Bottled water is expensive, wasteful, and less regulated than tap water. In fact, most bottled water is simply filtered tap water. Filtering your water at home is the most effective and least expensive option overall. However, you will need a good quality water filter, because tap water commonly contains contaminants such as lead, chloroform, arsenic, nitrate, nitrite, radon, and E. coli. The good news is that the filters featured here will remove most of these impurities.

Experts recommend that you should find out which pollutants are in your local water supply. You can then customize your filtration by selecting filters that target those specific pollutants. One way to find out is to check your consumer confidence report, or CCR. The EPA requires utilities to provide a CCR to their customers every year, and they are often available on government websites. Consumer Reports had this to say about CCRs:

Our recent analysis of CCRs from the 13 largest U.S. cities revealed that few claimed to have no federal water-quality violations. Though none of the other water systems were consistently unhealthful, all had some samples containing significant quantities of contaminants. In New York City, for example, some samples had lead levels several times the federal limit.

Here’s the list of the types of contaminants you want to remove from tap water:

  1. Organic compounds (Pesticides, Herbicides, Pharmaceuticals, Fuels, etc.)
  2. Toxic metals (Lead, Mercury, Aluminum, Cadmium, Chromium, Copper, etc.)
  3. Bacterial and viruses (Giardia, Cryptosporidium, etc.)
  4. Radioactive substances (Radon and Uranium, etc.)
  5. Additives (Chlorine and Chloramines, Fluoride, etc.)

Why Choose An Under-Sink Water Filter?

Under-sink water filters are the most convenient and less expensive type of water filter. Pitcher-based filters and faucet-mounted filters are not as effective as under-sink filters. In The Drinking Water Book, water filter expert Colin Ingram rates all pitcher filters and and faucet mounted filters as  “Acceptable” (the lowest rating). Good under-sink water filters get a rating of “Very Good” from him. Water distillers get a rating of “Excellent” but distillers are slow, expensive and time-consuming to operate. Reverse Osmosis filters work well and they are the only type certified to remove arsenic. But you must sanitize them with bleach periodically. Eventually the membrane must be replaced. They can also be extremely slow, rob cabinet space, and create 3 to 5 gallons of waste water for every gallon filtered.

Top Rated: The Multi-Pure MP750SB Water Filter

The Multi-Pure MP750SB is a three-stage carbon filter, certified to remove a range of important water contaminants — herbicides, heavy metals, industrial chemicals and volatile organic compounds.

This filter is certified by NSF International, which means it has been tested that it does in fact remove contaminants, and does not re-contaminate the water with bacteria. Many commonly available filters will let quite a few contaminants through. For example, in-fridge or faucet-mount filters may not filter VOCs and chlorination by-products like Trihalomethanes (THMs).

Besides the NSF certification, several states  such as California, Iowa, Wisconsin, and Massachusetts have certified this filter. The Multi-Pure MP750SB was also Consumer Reports’ top rated under-sink filter, with a rating of 90 out of 100.

The filter life is approximately 750 gallons, which translates into a year worth of filtration for most households. Replacement filters cost about $120 per year, making this filter inexpensive solution in the long-term.

See also the MP750SB filter’s home page.

You can find the Multi-Pure MP750SB at Amazon for around $429.*


 

Aqua-Pure by Cuno AP-DWS1000

The Aqua-Pure by Cuno AP-DWS1000 is another under-sink carbon filter that filters lead, sediment, rust, cysts, VOCs and other contaminants. Consumer Reports rated the filter 88 out of 100, the second highest score for an under-sink unit. It is also certified by the NSF, and sells for around $100 less than the Multi-Pure filter. The filter housing is constructed with plastic rather than the stainless steel housing on the Multi-Pure unit.

The AP-DWS1000 is rated to filter a total of 625 gallons, which equates to about 6 months of average usage. Note that the filter shuts off after this limit is reached!

Here’s the AP-DWS1000′s home page.

You can find the Aqua-Pure by Cuno AP-DWS1000 available on Amazon for about $330.

Posted in Arsenic, bottled water, bpa, carbon block technology, chlorine, compare water filters, contaminated water, drinking water, lead, mercury, multi-pure, perchlorate, plastic pollution, pollution, purification, tap water, water | 1 Comment » | Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,

The Problem With Bottled Water & Its Effects On Our Environment

December 14th, 2011
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Individual use of plastic water bottles has become a multi-billion dollar industry. Not only is bottled water much more expensive than tap water, but there is also a serious cost to our planet:

  • 1.5 million barrels of oil are used annually to manufacture plastic water bottles. (Earth Policy Institute)
  • 2 million tons of plastic bottles are land filled every year. (Worldwatch Institute)
  • Only 1 out of every 10 plastic bottles is recycled.
  • Bottled water has to either be pumped out of the ground or treated. Up to 1500 gallons of water are wasted during this process.
  • Bottled water uses fossil fuels in the making, filling, transporting, and recycling of plastic water bottles…up to 187 gallons of oil are spent! To learn more about this process, check out “The Story of Bottled Water” at www.storyofstuff.org/bottledwater.php
  • 1 billion pounds of CO2 is emitted in the transportation of bottled water in the United States alone.
  • 40% of PET bottles recycled in the United States in 2004 were exported – adding to the resources used.

Bottled water is drinking water packaged in plastic or glass containers. The dominant form is water packaged in new Polyethylene terephthalate bottles and sold retail. Another method of packaging is in larger high-density polyethylene plastic bottles, or polycarbonate plastic bottles, often used with water coolers.

Wasted material

The major criticism of bottled water concerns the bottles themselves. Individual use bottled water is generally packaged in Polyethylene terephthalate (PET). According to a NAPCOR study, PET water bottles account for 50% of all the PET bottles and containers collected by curbside recycling, and the recycling rate for water bottles is 23.4%, an increase over the 2006 rate of 20.1%. PET bottled water containers make up one-third of 1 percent of the waste stream in the United States.An estimated 50 billion bottles of water are consumed per annum in the US and around 200 billion bottles globally.

Health effects

Bottled water does not imply a specific treatment process or better process than tap water or another water source. Some bottled water is simply tap water bottled and sold. In the United States, the FDA regulates bottled water whilst the EPA regulates the quality of tap water and has created 90 maximum contaminant levels for drinking water and 15 secondary maximum contaminant levels.

According to a 1999 NRDC study, in which roughly 22 percent of brands were tested, at least one sample contained chemical contaminants at levels above strict state health limits. Some of the contaminants found in the study could pose health risks if consumed over a long period of time. However, the NRDC report conceded that “most waters contained no detectable bacteria, and the levels of synthetic organic chemicals and inorganic chemicals of concern for which were tested were either below detection limits or well below all applicable standards.” Meanwhile, a report by the Drinking Water Research Foundation found that of all samples tested by NRDC, “federal FDA or EPA limits were allegedly exceeded only four times, twice for total coliforms and twice for fluorides.”

The rate of total dissolved solids is sometimes 4 times higher in bottled mineral waters than in bottled tap ones.

Another study, conducted by the Goethe University at Frankfurt found that a high percentage of the bottled water, contained in plastic containers were polluted with estrogenic chemicals. Although some of the bottled water contained in glass were found polluted with chemicals as well, the researchers believe some of the contamination in the plastic containers may have come from the plastic containers themselves.

Bottled water vs tap water

In the United States, bottled water costs between $0.25 and $2 per bottle while tap water costs less than US$0.01.In 1999, according to a NRDC study, U.S. consumers paid between 240 and 10,000 times more per unit volume for bottled water than for tap water.Typically 90 percent or more of the cost paid by bottled water consumers goes to things other than the water itself—bottling, packaging, shipping, marketing, retailing, other expenses, and profit.

In some areas, tap water may contain added fluoride, which helps prevent tooth decay and cavities, but may also produce negative toxicological side-effects.

Bottled water has reduced amounts of copper, lead, and other metal contaminants since it does not run through the plumbing pipes where tap water is exposed to metal corrosion. However, this varies by the household and plumbing system.

In a study with 57 bottled water samples and tap water samples, all of the tap water samples had a bacterial content under 3 CFUs/mL and the bottled water samples’ bacterial content ranged from 0.01-4900 CFUs/mL(colony-forming unit). Most of the water bottle samples were under 1 CFU/mL, though there were 15 water bottle samples containing 6-4900 CFUs/mL.

In another study comparing 25 different bottled waters, most of the samples resulted exceeding the contaminant level set by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency‎ (EPA) for mercury, thallium, and thorium. Being exposed to these contaminants in high concentration for long periods of time can cause liver and kidney damage, and increase risk for lung and pancreas disease.

In much of the developed world chlorine is often added as a disinfectant. If the water contains organic matter, this can produce other products in the water such as trihalomethanes and haloacetic acids. The level of residual chlorine found is small at around 00.2g per litre which is too small to directly cause any health problems.

The Natural Resources Defense Council, Sierra Club and World Wildlife Fund have all urged their supporters to consume less bottled water. Anti-bottled water campaigns and organizations, such as Corporate Accountability International, typically argue that bottled water is no better than tap water, and emphasize the environmental side-effects of disposable plastic bottles.

The Showtime series Penn & Teller: Bullshit! demonstrated, in a 2007 episode, that in a controlled setting, diners could not discern between bottled water and water from a garden hose behind the restaurant.

Privatization of water

The United Church of Christ, United Church of Canada, National Council of Churches, National Coalition of American Nuns and Presbyterians for Restoring Creation are among some of the religious organizations that have raised questions about whether or not the “privatization” of water is ethical. They regard the industrial purchase and repackaging at a much higher resale price of a basic resource as an unethical trend.

The recent documentary Tapped argues against the bottled water industry, asserting that tap water is healthier, more environmentally sustainable and more ecologically just than bottled water. The film focuses on the bottled water industry in the United States. The film has largely seen positive reviews, and has spawned college campus groups such as Beyond the Bottle.

Tapped is a film that examines the role of the bottled water industry and its effects on our health, climate change, pollution, and our reliance on oil. visit: http://www.tappedthefilm.com/

The Answer?

Home Water Filter Systems. Fortunately, there is an inexpensive and reliable alternative to tap water and bottled water. Home water filter systems are a far better option than bottled water in every way. A quality home water filter system filters out the dangerous contaminants found in tap water, including lead, chlorine, herbicides and pesticides. The home water filter industry has developed a wide variety of filter options, from drinking water filters to attach to your kitchen faucet, to under sink filters to shower filters to whole house water filters.

For pennies per gallon, a quality home water filter system turns your tap water into clean, healthy and safe water. No more bottles to deal with, no more bad taste or smell to your water, and no more concern about the water you and your family are drinking every day. For your health, for your budget and for our environment, a Multi-Pure home water filter is the best choice by far.

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How Much Chlorine is in your water – Multipure OTO Chlorine Test

September 3rd, 2011
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Kenton Jones from Multipure takes us on a demonstration with OTO, a swimming pool chemical that measures chlorine in water. Check out this demonstration on dry foods such as pasta, jasmine rice and pinto beans when added to chlorinated water. OTO can be purchased at any pool suppy store. Do the following tests and see what happens for yourself. For more info visit us at http://multipureusa.com/pconnor

Posted in chloramine, chlorine, contaminated water, multi-pure, water, water filters | No Comments » | Tags: , ,

Dangers Of Manganese In Drinking Water

September 1st, 2011
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Children’s Intellectual Abilities Affected By Manganese In Drinking Water

Montreal - A study that looked at manganese in drinking water in eight different Quebec communities found that increased levels of the mineral resulted in a measurable decrease in the intellect of children who drank the water.

Key researcher, Dr. Maryse Bouchard, and eight other Canadian colleagues who worked on the project, are calling on the government of Canada to set new guidelines for manganese in drinking water because the levels of manganese they measured in groundwater during the study were below the maximum levels currently allowed. The authors also say the study should be duplicated in other communities.

Published in the journal, Environmental Health Perspectives on Monday, the study, Intellectual Impairment in School-Age Children Exposed to Manganese from Drinking Water examined the link between manganese, groundwater and children’s intellect; finding a very strong correlation. The research results are free to access and are available as a pdf.

In a press release announcing the report, the researchers stated

“… children exposed to high concentrations of manganese in drinking water performed less well in tests of intellectual skills that children are less exposed.

… The neurotoxic effects of manganese exposure are well known in the workplace. Present in the soil, this metal is also found naturally in groundwater. Several regions in Quebec, Canada and around the world have naturally high levels of manganese in the groundwater. Are there dangers? What may be its effect on children’s health? This is the first study to focus on potential risks of exposure to manganese in drinking water in North America.”

After accounting for manganese from food, the ingestion of other metals found in the drinking water, and many other factors that might impact findings, such as maternal depression and smoking; the researchers noted the association between levels of manganese from groundwater and intellect held. Most alarmingly, the study found

“… a very significant reduction of intelligence quotient (IQ) of children has been observed in connection with the presence of manganese in drinking water, and that at concentrations of manganese currently considered low, and without risk to health.”

The impacts of those low levels of maganese were quite striking.

“The children in whom the concentration of manganese in water was 20% in the highest had an average IQ of 6 points lower than children whose water does not contain manganese.”

The researchers also concluded that humans metabolize manganese from water differently than from food.

Small amounts of manganese, like many other metals, are needed for human health, but too much manganese can create a host of health problems. Too much manganese becomes a neurotoxin for the human brain.

Some municipalities already filter out metals from drinking water. For those living in communities that do not filter out metals, study co-author Benoit Barbeau recommends

“… the use of filtering pitchers that contain a mixture of resin and activated carbon. Such devices can reduce the concentration of manganese 60-100% depending on the level of filter usage and characteristics of the water to be treated.”

The research project used hair clippings and water testing to determine how much manganese the 362 children, aged between 6 and 13 years, had taken in over time through drinking water.

Health Canada has estimated the average Canadian ingests, through a variety of sources, about 4.7 mg of manganese daily. Health Canada goes on to state

“… The Recommended Daily Intake (RDI) of manganese for Canadians has yet to be established. In a recent comprehensive literature survey of studies of manganese metabolism in humans, it was concluded that previous estimates for a safe and adequate daily dietary allowance for manganese (2.5-5.0 mg/d) were too low, and a new range of 3.5-7.0 mg/d was recommended for adults.(31) A statistical analysis of the metabolic studies showed that a daily manganese intake of approximately 5 mg is required to consistently maintain a positive balance.”

However, the Quebec study demonstrated that lower levels of manganese ingested through drinking water provided sufficient accumulation in children so as to impair with brain functioning. The researchers also noted that Canada has no guidelines for manganese levels in drinking water, and manganese levels are thus not regulated.

The report concludes

“Because of the common occurrence of this metal in drinking water and the observed effects at low manganese concentration in water, we believe that national and international guidelines for safe manganese in water should be revisited.”


 

 

Posted in contaminated water, drinking water, pollution, tap water, water filters | 2 Comments » | Tags: , , , , , , ,

Kermit, TX Residents Seeing Dirty Water Pouring Out of Their Faucets

August 31st, 2011
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by Anayeli Ruiz
NewsWest 9

KERMIT – It’s freaking some people out in Kermit. Dark and dirty water pouring out of their faucets. It looks so nasty people are afraid to use it. Some of our viewers wanted to know what was going on.  So we decided to track down the problem. As NewsWest 9 found out, the city says it’s not only normal, it’s clean.

“Dirty water. If I’m drinking that water, I don’t know what I’m drinking,” Resident, Rita Dominguez, said.

Fear is what many residents in Kermit are experiencing when they turn on their faucet. They are scared of what will come out.

“My neighbor across the way came over one morning asked me if my water was brown. When she draws out bath water or it comes out of the toilet, it’ brown and really dirty,” Resident, Anita Gloege, said.

City officials say the water is safe and clean, even though it may look dirty, it isn’t.

“Sure the water is aesthetically pleasing to look at, there is no health issues,” John Shepherd, Director of Public Works, said.

Believe it or not, the City of Kermit doesn’t have a filtration system. They only use chlorine to flush out the chemicals.

The water they have been getting lately has high levels of manganese and iron and when those are mixed with chlorine and it comes out as brown pigmented water.

“We have got iron and manganese in our water. We have always had it, it’s a common element for this area. You can’t see it until the chlorine hits the water to disinfect it. As soon as we disinfect it, they show up and precipitate and become visible,” Shepherd said.

Officials say the more water that you use, the more likely you’ll be to see the dirty looking water.

“Where the demand goes, usually more affluent neighborhoods, you pull harder on systems and pull that dirty water towards them,” Shepherd said.

The city normally flushes their systems once in April and once in October. This is to help clean and get rid of all the elements. In the meantime, residents will have to wait it out a little longer before they get the pipes flushed out.

“If I flush now, I will be flushing it again. Economics and the demand on the water system, I will be doing it again in 30 days. We’re still in a high demand, we have about 30 more days,” Shepherd said.

Some residents are not happy with the wait.

“It’s not normal. We pay for the water, they need to do something about it,” Dominguez said.

City officials say if you get dirty water, let it run for 15-20 minutes. If you continue to see the dirty water, call the city in Kermit.

Posted in chlorine, drinking water, environment, purification, water filters | No Comments » | Tags: , , ,
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