I lived for years in DC and did not have drinkable water in my home. Why? It was heavily contaminated with lead--not from within my house, which has copper pipes--but from the city-controlled supply pipes in the streets. The water was clean when it left the treatment plant. When our water was tested, the lead rate was 52 times the allowable rate. Which is dangerously high. I had a two year old in my home at the time. Yes, the EPA knows all about this. No, they still haven't replaced the city's lead pipes almost five years later.

I am very thankful that I was skeptical enough to use bottled water at the time that this happened. (My fear wasn't even lead, but crytosporidium, which often found its way into the public water supply.) It was a small price to pay for not having a brain-damaged child. Even in the capital of the richest country in the world, you apparently cannot count on having clean drinking water in your home. Before you tout the benefits of tap water, have it tested.

...of bottles with a filter in the lid. You can add tap water and have your bottled water without the extra plastic.

I used to buy a bottle almost every work day. The concerns over plastic(and all of the nasty stuff that seems to be leaching out of it)and cost were a concern. I had been meaning to pick up an aluminum bottle (not sure about Nalgene these days either). Hubby got me one for Christmas from the local Art Museum. I fill it with filtered water at home before I leave the house.It is convenient, stays pretty cold in the aluminum and a valued local non profit made a few bucks. That purchase also just ensured that easily 200 bottles a year stay out of the recycling container.

While I agree that there is some water that is unsafe to drink, many do not trust water that has been tested.

I live on a boat much of the year and I have a reverse osmosis watermaker. I always test the water and it tests better than San Diego city water. I also can fill up at a marina that has filtered water and that tests very well also. I've done this test on water that leaves my faucet, after being in our tanks and that has gone through my boat's piping.

I still provide bottled water for most of my friends and family because they do not trust either source of my water. I can drink gallons of it, and yet some of my friends will still use the bottled water to even brush their teeth...so it's not a matter of "taste" that so many claim.

For people that truly do fear their drinking water, what's wrong with the large reusable plastic jugs? Besides being more environmentally sound, it's tons cheaper. If someone isn't able to lug the bottle around to the store, even delivered water would seem to work out better and be cheaper.

Pablo writes "Bottled water also represents a major ethical dilemma, given that millions of people around the world lack access to clean and safe drinking water."

I don't see how this constitutes an ethical dilemma. Millions of people lack many things, but that does not mean that people who do have those things have done something ethically questionable.

The 1l glass is too big and heavy. So I will continue to get 1 pt San Pellegrino.

First, I want to say that mcytron makes a good point: one reason for the rising bottled-water is the decline in municipal service. I feel as though private capitalism will always win out over public services here in the US, but I should think it would be hard to deny that investment in infrastructure (like bridges or the power grid) has been largely abandoned in the last couple of centuries.

Time was, you could get fresh, clean, nearly free water right from the tap, but as infrastructure aged and decayed, so did quality.

One facet of the current campaign is the promise of change, with a focus domestic issues and improving the lot of 'the little guy'. It is no surprise that Republican fear-mongering has also recently revived the specter of the New Deal and other large-scale social investments: it's because the country's infrastructure- much of which was built during the New Deal- is starting to fall apart. We NEED to focus on upgrading infrastructure, especially electric and telecommunications.

Anywho, I enjoyed this first article, hope there's much more to come.

I got a Ben and Jerry's shake last week, and the clear-plastic cup said it was made of corn-- whaddup with that?

Although I have some sympathy for the bottle vs. tap argument, Paster also offers a somewhat skewed picture here. In reality, bottled water is often an alternative NOT to tap water or local bottles, but to sodas. Thanks to the bottled water market, you can now go to a movie or a school vending machine and get water instead of something much worse from a health standpoint. Seen this way, the "trendiness" of water brands is a useful corrective rather than a simple scam.

Sounds like a big and winning lawsuit.

I think a lot of the fear we have of tap water is generated by marketing and not based on reality.

When I have tested by water at the various places I have lived, it's always come out just fine.

1. There is also the question of the safety of all those PET bottles. Antimony and acetaldehyde are commonly found leaching into the water contained in PET bottles (and this is an especial problem if the bottles have been subjected to various types of abuse, such as temperature extremes). Neither of these are necessarily health hazards, particularly in the concentrations typically found in PET bottles. But it does make one wonder if one is simply trading some types of contamination (in tap water) for others (in bottled water).

2. For those who are dissatisfied with the taste or potential contamination with their local tap water, might I recommend a distiller? My wife and I tried a distiller when our baby was born, and we are practically unable to drink ANY tap water now -- the taste is incomparable. Good distillers don't allow the water or steam to come into contact with any plastic at all.

Some people have expressed concern that distilled water, with its almost complete absence of contaminants, may deprive the body of necessary minerals. Since most foods are comprised substantially of water, this is a non-issue.