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Just Say No to... Bottled Water · Stuff You Should Know

0:01
Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff you Should Know, a production of I
0:04
Speaker 1: Heart Radio. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh,
0:13
Speaker 1: and there's Chuck and there's Jerry, and this is stuff
0:16
Speaker 1: you should know. Unscrew the caps and glug it down. Addition, Uh,
0:23
Speaker 1: that's right. And you know what I think we should
0:25
Speaker 1: say the outset here. Uh, now, no, we have to do.
0:33
Speaker 1: You know what I'm gonna say, Um that we are
0:38
Speaker 1: using a well it's from Julia Layton, actually, one of
0:41
Speaker 1: our writers, but it's from an old how Stuff Works article. Uh.
0:45
Speaker 1: And when I say old, I mean that it's from
0:48
Speaker 1: two thousand five or six or so old unbottled water. Um,
0:54
Speaker 1: so it is old, but I mean I think that
0:56
Speaker 1: most of the stuff in here is still true from
1:00
Speaker 1: skucking in and researching further. But what it did do
1:04
Speaker 1: was provide an interesting look at statistics, because you know,
1:08
Speaker 1: we had to get updated statistics on how much bottled
1:10
Speaker 1: water we use and how big the industry's And it's
1:14
Speaker 1: really amazing though, just to have sort of a before
1:16
Speaker 1: after picture from two thousand six to now two thousand
1:21
Speaker 1: I mean I saw stats from like twenty and twenty one. Yeah,
1:24
Speaker 1: there's been a tad bit of growth since two thousand
1:27
Speaker 1: six in that industry. Yeah, I think like one statue
1:30
Speaker 1: she cites, and we're gonna go through all this. But
1:33
Speaker 1: just as an example, is seven billion gallons of bottled
1:36
Speaker 1: water we're consumed by Americans in two thousand five, and
1:40
Speaker 1: I got from twenty nineteen that is I'm sorry, that
1:45
Speaker 1: is now fifteen billion gallons. That is a tremendous increase
1:51
Speaker 1: in bottled water gallons per American, per year, per American,
1:56
Speaker 1: includes dumb babies. It's a lot of water. I mean,
1:58
Speaker 1: I guess it's better then if we were if we
2:02
Speaker 1: had decided to all start drinking like that much high
2:05
Speaker 1: fruit toast corn syrup every year. But there's a lot
2:10
Speaker 1: of there's a lot of problems with bottled water, as
2:13
Speaker 1: you can imagine, and maybe some you can't quite imagine yet.
2:15
Speaker 1: But we're gonna go over all that. We're gonna give
2:17
Speaker 1: you the ins and out to bottled water. Okay, so
2:21
Speaker 1: please forgive us. This is kind of an old article.
2:23
Speaker 1: I I that what perked my ears up, Chuck, is
2:25
Speaker 1: that she referred to bottled waters new fangled. At one point,
2:29
Speaker 1: I said, people who who drink bottled water just think
2:32
Speaker 1: they're so fancy, and I was like, this seems old.
2:34
Speaker 1: This seems like an old way of looking at well.
2:37
Speaker 1: It's it is interesting because I think that was true
2:40
Speaker 1: for a while, and then I think we're to point
2:42
Speaker 1: now ino where there's a large portion of America that
2:51
Speaker 1: doesn't want to get bottled water at all anymore and
2:55
Speaker 1: refuses to use like single plastic, single use plastics like this. Uh.
3:00
Speaker 1: But there are also still a lot of people that
3:02
Speaker 1: you know, you go and you see him, like loading
3:04
Speaker 1: up by the caseful to stock their house. I can
3:09
Speaker 1: see an emergency stash of something maybe, but I'm just
3:13
Speaker 1: talking like, let me give you an example. I have
3:18
Speaker 1: to tread carefully, uh, because this is a person in
3:22
Speaker 1: our lives. Not your life, but our lives, mine and
3:25
Speaker 1: Emily's lives. But we have a human in our life
3:28
Speaker 1: that came to see us and I bought a bunch
3:32
Speaker 1: of you know, and when we did like, hey, I'm
3:33
Speaker 1: going to the grocery store for the week. Uh, And
3:35
Speaker 1: they went with us and they bought they wanted to buy,
3:37
Speaker 1: like a case of bottle of water. We're like, oh no, no, no, please,
3:42
Speaker 1: don't trying to tread carefully though, you know, we're like,
3:45
Speaker 1: we got really good filtration, good water. It's good, good good. Uh.
3:50
Speaker 1: And they said that they're on a thing where they
3:51
Speaker 1: have to drink so much water. I was like, oh,
3:53
Speaker 1: that's great, uh, and we have a good filtration system here. Um.
3:57
Speaker 1: But they were like, well, it really helps me keep
3:59
Speaker 1: up with how much I'm drink king if I do
4:01
Speaker 1: it per bottle. And Emily just looked at me like
4:04
Speaker 1: she's just like, just shut up, you know. She gave
4:06
Speaker 1: me that look, and I did. But it was really
4:08
Speaker 1: frustrating to know that it's not any easier to keep
4:12
Speaker 1: up than drinking a glass of water. Yeah, I wonder
4:16
Speaker 1: how much. I wonder how much. Also though that person
4:19
Speaker 1: like really just felt like bottled water was healthier or
4:23
Speaker 1: pure or whatever, and it wasn't. It was more than
4:26
Speaker 1: just that. Who knows. I don't know. The reason they
4:28
Speaker 1: gave though, was keeping up with it, Like they lined
4:31
Speaker 1: the bottles up at the end of every day and
4:33
Speaker 1: like shot them with a six shooter that's right right
4:36
Speaker 1: into the ocean. They drove him out to that. But anyway,
4:39
Speaker 1: it's a personal frustration and I'm trying. I'm going to
4:41
Speaker 1: try not to like just live on my soapbox in
4:44
Speaker 1: this episode. But suffice it to say, I I really
4:49
Speaker 1: don't like bottled water, and I try to. I've seen
4:52
Speaker 1: the light, and I will only get bottled water if
4:54
Speaker 1: I'm in a real, real pinch and have to. If
4:57
Speaker 1: somebody's pinching you and they're like, I'm not going to
5:00
Speaker 1: up until you buy bottled water, you do it. No.
5:02
Speaker 1: I mean sometimes when you got a kid, you're stuck
5:04
Speaker 1: somewhere and you're like, you know, you have to hydrate
5:06
Speaker 1: your child. You're like, oh God, I gotta get this
5:08
Speaker 1: bottled water, and I hate it. You're out of high
5:10
Speaker 1: freak toast corn, sir, right uh, And and then try to,
5:15
Speaker 1: you know, at least like, at least let me get
5:17
Speaker 1: like spring water or something. But when the only option
5:20
Speaker 1: is and we'll get to all this is just like
5:22
Speaker 1: purified bottled tap water. I just wanna crawl under the rug. Yeah, well,
5:28
Speaker 1: come out from under the rug, Chuckley. We got to
5:30
Speaker 1: talk about bottled water, so I just wanted to level set.
5:34
Speaker 1: So um, Okay, I think you did that pretty well.
5:36
Speaker 1: Let's talk a little a little history about bottled water. Um.
5:40
Speaker 1: And this comes to us from our friends over at
5:42
Speaker 1: Serious Eats this part's interesting. I thought so too. So um,
5:45
Speaker 1: bottled water has been around I saw somewhere since the
5:48
Speaker 1: eighteenth century in America. Certainly in the mid nineteenth century
5:53
Speaker 1: there were people bottling water and selling them and usually
5:56
Speaker 1: it was like as a remedy. It was a healthy thing,
5:58
Speaker 1: and you would buy them at like spas or something.
6:01
Speaker 1: But that's definitely the origin of bottle water. Yeah, and
6:05
Speaker 1: perry A. You know, I'm I'm sure you remember when
6:07
Speaker 1: we were kids that before like bottle water was as
6:11
Speaker 1: we know, it was such a big thing. Perry A
6:14
Speaker 1: was something you started seeing ads for on TV and
6:17
Speaker 1: in magazines. That was just I think they were smart
6:20
Speaker 1: enough to brand it early on, or not early on
6:22
Speaker 1: in there. I mean they've been around since the mid
6:24
Speaker 1: eighteen hundreds, but early on in the seventies and eighties
6:28
Speaker 1: in America of like, you know, a fancy schmancy thing
6:31
Speaker 1: to do. Yeah, the Patrick Bateman types really slurped it
6:34
Speaker 1: down right. Yeah, But that was that was because of
6:37
Speaker 1: a rebranding that they did a hundred and twenty years
6:40
Speaker 1: after they started selling this stuff here in America. They
6:44
Speaker 1: hired Orson Wells, They got People magazine to write about it.
6:46
Speaker 1: Just became like a thing, and it really dovetailed with
6:50
Speaker 1: that kind of health consciousness that was starting to kind
6:53
Speaker 1: of blossom among baby boomers, who were again all Patrick
6:56
Speaker 1: Bateman type still are, and so Harry became like the
7:01
Speaker 1: first bottled water that America kind of became obsessed with.
7:05
Speaker 1: But it was like aspirational, it was expensive, um, and
7:10
Speaker 1: it was a status symbol, plain and simple. It wasn't
7:13
Speaker 1: until Coke and Pepsi really got into the game that
7:16
Speaker 1: it became like the thing that it is now. Yeah,
7:20
Speaker 1: And I think Pepsi got in first in ninety four
7:23
Speaker 1: with their aquafine a brand, and I think Coke for
7:27
Speaker 1: a while, and I think Coke for a while it's like, no, no, no,
7:31
Speaker 1: we're in the soda game and we don't want this
7:33
Speaker 1: water thing cutting into our soda business because I think
7:38
Speaker 1: they were scared by Perry because they were also marketing
7:40
Speaker 1: it as an alternative soda, like a healthy alternative. And
7:44
Speaker 1: then Pepsi started crushing it, and then Coke was like, well,
7:48
Speaker 1: we can't have that. No, so they launched a sani,
7:51
Speaker 1: which apparently means it means nothing. It's just supposed to
7:55
Speaker 1: evoke like um, a kind of like a refreshing, pure
7:59
Speaker 1: since they ation I guess, I guess um or sorry,
8:03
Speaker 1: a clean, fresh taste that a Coke spokesperson back in
8:06
Speaker 1: the late nineties early two thousand's um. And then that
8:09
Speaker 1: also set off a huge consolidation rush where there I mean,
8:13
Speaker 1: some of the brands that you know today a bottled
8:15
Speaker 1: water like Arrowhead and Poland Springs and Deer Park, they've
8:18
Speaker 1: been around since the mid nineteenth century. They got snatched
8:23
Speaker 1: up by all these larger brands are consolidated. Um. When
8:27
Speaker 1: people started to say, yeah, we'll drink bottle of water,
8:29
Speaker 1: and I remember very clearly in the late nineties early
8:32
Speaker 1: two thousands, there was a big cultural um discussion, I guess,
8:38
Speaker 1: but also kind of chiding of people who drank bottle
8:40
Speaker 1: of water because people like to point out, like a
8:43
Speaker 1: lot of that stuff is coming out of the tap somewhere.
8:45
Speaker 1: It's just purified. And after all that, after the whole
8:49
Speaker 1: discussion was done, America said, you know what we want,
8:52
Speaker 1: bottle water. That's what we're going to drink. And in
8:54
Speaker 1: two thousand seventeen it became the most consumed beverage in
8:58
Speaker 1: the entire United State. Eats bottled water. Yeah, Wow, how
9:02
Speaker 1: about more than more than coffee. And I've been doing
9:05
Speaker 1: my part to keep coffee up there statistically speaking, and
9:08
Speaker 1: it still beats coffee, still beats coke, beats everything else.
9:12
Speaker 1: Bottled water beer beats beer. Yeah, yeah, bottled beer or
9:16
Speaker 1: canned beer. Crazy. Uh yeah, it's hard to believe, um,
9:21
Speaker 1: but that's kind of what's happened here. Um. Julia points
9:24
Speaker 1: out that there are a few reasons, and you mentioned
9:27
Speaker 1: them a little bit with my mystery guests that some
9:31
Speaker 1: of the other reasons people might drink bottle water is
9:33
Speaker 1: they think it might be healthier or more pure, or
9:36
Speaker 1: they might just think it tastes better than tap water,
9:39
Speaker 1: which actually could be the case. There's uh, certainly some
9:43
Speaker 1: funky tasting tapwater in America, depending on where you live,
9:47
Speaker 1: you know, definitely, and there's a lot of people who, um,
9:51
Speaker 1: who like kind of take the opposite tack there, Like
9:54
Speaker 1: America has some of the best, cleanest, safest drinking water
9:58
Speaker 1: in the world, and in some parts of America it's
10:01
Speaker 1: just straight up amazing. Like remember our episode on the
10:03
Speaker 1: New York City's water delivery system and just how amazingly
10:07
Speaker 1: good New York City tap water is. Like in some
10:11
Speaker 1: places there are like the local tap water is what
10:14
Speaker 1: they sell as spring water basically. Um, so some people
10:18
Speaker 1: have it better than others, but in general, people who
10:22
Speaker 1: drink tap water kind of they just take a certain
10:26
Speaker 1: tact towards bottle water, like you're dummy for drinking that,
10:29
Speaker 1: it doesn't make any sense, whereas people with bottle waters, say,
10:32
Speaker 1: you're drinking poison right out of your kitchen sink. I
10:35
Speaker 1: can't believe you would do that to yourself in your family.
10:37
Speaker 1: So there's kind of like a disconnect there between those
10:40
Speaker 1: two groups. Yeah, and to be sure, we are not
10:43
Speaker 1: talking about I mean there are some My my friend,
10:45
Speaker 1: uh Dave Barnhardt is a documentary filmmaker who um has
10:51
Speaker 1: made a documentary on the water in Flint, Michigan. And
10:55
Speaker 1: we're not talking about places where the tapwaters like legit
10:59
Speaker 1: dangerous and it's aimful that that kind of thing goes
11:02
Speaker 1: on in this country these days. So we're not talking
11:05
Speaker 1: about that. We're talking about garden variety tap water that's
11:08
Speaker 1: generally pretty safe. Um, Florida's got some funky water to
11:12
Speaker 1: my friend, egg water. Yeah, well I went to uh
11:15
Speaker 1: my Disney World trip, I got some pretty funky egg
11:18
Speaker 1: water there. Yes, it can be funky. And it's not
11:21
Speaker 1: just funky to drink, it's funky to bathe in. It's
11:24
Speaker 1: funny to be like in the same city as it's
11:27
Speaker 1: just it's funky stuff. For those of you have never
11:29
Speaker 1: experienced egg water, it's called that because it smells a
11:33
Speaker 1: lot like rotten eggs. It's got a lot of sulfur
11:35
Speaker 1: content in it. Totally safe, nothing's wrong with it. Uh,
11:39
Speaker 1: it may even bestow some health benefits compared to water
11:43
Speaker 1: that has a lower sulfur content. Interesting. The upshot of
11:46
Speaker 1: it is it's funky, and it smells bad, and it
11:49
Speaker 1: tastes bad, and you don't really want that. But unfortunately
11:52
Speaker 1: there are some parts of Florida that do have that
11:54
Speaker 1: as their tap water. Now, can you get a filtration
11:57
Speaker 1: system that actually gets rid of that taste? If you
11:59
Speaker 1: do have that coming here for sure? If you want
12:01
Speaker 1: to get rid of everything, you just get a reverse
12:04
Speaker 1: osmosis system, so simple as that. The problem is it
12:07
Speaker 1: takes out everything, So there's beneficial stuff and water you
12:10
Speaker 1: don't really want to take out magnesium, potassium, um, calcium,
12:15
Speaker 1: and probably a bunch of other little micro nutrients and
12:17
Speaker 1: minerals too. That we don't even know about yet. Reverse
12:20
Speaker 1: osmosis takes everything out, which we talked about. We did
12:24
Speaker 1: some sort of water purification episode not too long ago. Yeah,
12:27
Speaker 1: I think that was our water treatment. That was a
12:28
Speaker 1: good one. Okay, so in reverse I think we also
12:31
Speaker 1: do one specifically on reverse osmosis too, if I'm not mistaken. Yeah,
12:35
Speaker 1: So it takes everything out. So if you want to
12:37
Speaker 1: get everything out, just get a reverse osmosis system and
12:39
Speaker 1: you're fine. You should be the spokesperson. That's pretty tight. Well,
12:43
Speaker 1: I don't personally believe in reverse osmosis systems. I think
12:46
Speaker 1: it takes too much out and you just have pure water,
12:50
Speaker 1: and I think the water that we drink is supposed
12:52
Speaker 1: to have a little more in there. This would make
12:55
Speaker 1: a terrible ad for reverse osmosis. The second part way
12:57
Speaker 1: for sure, Uh, Julia, And is again from two thousand five,
13:01
Speaker 1: so this is when this was around. But it is
13:03
Speaker 1: pretty interesting to look back at. You know, Bottle labeling
13:06
Speaker 1: is a big thing and you can put a I
13:09
Speaker 1: mean you can't lie on a water bottle out right,
13:12
Speaker 1: but you can get really generous with how far you
13:14
Speaker 1: stretch things. Uh. And there was a company. It's not
13:17
Speaker 1: around anymore called Alaska Water at one point that said
13:21
Speaker 1: Alaska Premium Glacier drinking water, pure glacier water from the
13:26
Speaker 1: last unpolluted frontier, and it came literally from Juneo, Alaska
13:32
Speaker 1: tap water. Yeah, the municipal supply. Yeah, which I guess
13:36
Speaker 1: is uh, you know, if you trace it back, it
13:40
Speaker 1: might come originally from the last unpolluted frontier. Sure. Yeah, No,
13:44
Speaker 1: there's certainly a certain there's a bit of legitimacy to that,
13:48
Speaker 1: but it's it's dishonest still. Yeah, there's there was also
13:53
Speaker 1: one called Glacier clear Water UM that until two thousand
13:57
Speaker 1: two was owned by the Dairy Farmers of America in
14:00
Speaker 1: Kansas City, Missouri. That was sourced in Greenville, Tennessee. So
14:04
Speaker 1: it had nothing to do with glaciers. Like there may
14:07
Speaker 1: have been glacial activity at the last Ice Age around
14:10
Speaker 1: that part of Tennessee maybe, but the water in Tennessee
14:14
Speaker 1: was not coming from any glacial activity um. And so
14:17
Speaker 1: stuff like that that really made the rounds in the
14:19
Speaker 1: early two thousands and made people who were into bottle
14:21
Speaker 1: water look like idiots. Um. But again, even through that
14:27
Speaker 1: kind of gauntlet that bottled water drinkers that Americans in
14:30
Speaker 1: general had to go through on the other side, Like,
14:34
Speaker 1: the propensity for for bottled water was not beaten out
14:38
Speaker 1: of us, it was, it just got even more homed.
14:41
Speaker 1: I guess it's it's strange that that happened, that there
14:44
Speaker 1: was a pushback on the whole thing, and then that
14:47
Speaker 1: pushback just got totally overwhelmed. Yeah. Yeah, it's pretty interesting. Um.
14:52
Speaker 1: I think before we break, maybe we should at least
14:54
Speaker 1: go over the kinds of bottled water that the f
14:58
Speaker 1: d A like the terms the FDA regulates. Yes, at
15:02
Speaker 1: least Okay, Uh, we should start with artesian It's a
15:06
Speaker 1: great sounding word. It sounds very fancy, and that means
15:09
Speaker 1: it comes from an artesian well, which means it comes
15:13
Speaker 1: from a confined aquifer, which is a porous rocket's underground
15:18
Speaker 1: and it comes from porous rock or sand formations. That. Uh,
15:22
Speaker 1: it's under a lot of pressure from these layers of
15:25
Speaker 1: rock or clay and it forces that water up. I
15:29
Speaker 1: think we might have talked about artesian water, but maybe not.
15:33
Speaker 1: There's no way in the last fourteen years we've never
15:35
Speaker 1: mentioned artesian water, you know. I think so there's also
15:39
Speaker 1: mineral water, mineral water, Yeah, I do too. A lot.
15:43
Speaker 1: Mineral water is just water that has a higher um
15:46
Speaker 1: higher content of total dissolved solids, which sounds gross, and
15:50
Speaker 1: it can be gross, for sure, but it's more talking
15:53
Speaker 1: about things like I mentioned earlier, calcium, magnesium, sodium, potassium,
15:57
Speaker 1: stuff that gives water taste, distinctive taste, and in particular,
16:01
Speaker 1: mineral water taste. UM. So, I think the standard because
16:06
Speaker 1: you said the FDA regulate system. We'll talk more about
16:08
Speaker 1: that in a little bit, but the FDA standards that
16:10
Speaker 1: to be mineral water has to be spring water that
16:12
Speaker 1: has at least two parts per million of total dissolved solids.
16:16
Speaker 1: Regular old spring water, non mineral water has fifty. It's
16:20
Speaker 1: a big difference that your tongue can pick up on. Uh.
16:24
Speaker 1: Then you got your naturally sparkling, sparkling water. Uh. And
16:28
Speaker 1: this is yes, folks, there is water that comes from
16:31
Speaker 1: a spring or an artesian well that is naturally carbonated.
16:35
Speaker 1: And even if they take that carbonation out and then
16:38
Speaker 1: put it back in, according to the FDA, you have
16:40
Speaker 1: to recarbonate it to the levels that it once was
16:44
Speaker 1: naturally to qualify for that language. Yeah, And I went
16:47
Speaker 1: and looked, and I was sad to see that my
16:48
Speaker 1: favorite Sam Pellegrino water. It uh, it is artificially carbonated
16:54
Speaker 1: after the fact, and that's sad because I was looking
16:57
Speaker 1: into this and apparently um natural carbonation, which like volcano
17:03
Speaker 1: is heating the rock that the that holds the aquifer
17:07
Speaker 1: and it turns the carbon into a gas, and so
17:10
Speaker 1: it's naturally carbonated. Apparently it's much softer, less harsh on
17:14
Speaker 1: the throat and the stomach. Um. But it's really really
17:17
Speaker 1: hard to keep water carbonated and then get it to market.
17:21
Speaker 1: So they take the water out and then recarbonated and
17:25
Speaker 1: then sell it. So it's really hard to find naturally
17:27
Speaker 1: carbonated water. And I think it's very expensive too. I
17:30
Speaker 1: like that Tobo Chico. I don't believe that that is
17:33
Speaker 1: naturally carbonated. I I'm sure it's probably not because it
17:38
Speaker 1: is good, though I agree it makes me sneeze every
17:40
Speaker 1: time I drink it. But that comes to a glass bottle.
17:42
Speaker 1: It tickles your nose, it does, and we don't buy
17:44
Speaker 1: cases in cases of it. It's a treat, yeah, and
17:47
Speaker 1: it does come in a glass bottle. But Chuck, I've
17:48
Speaker 1: seen you. You You have a ritual where every time you
17:50
Speaker 1: finish off a bottle of smash it on the ground
17:53
Speaker 1: and shout say yahoo. Yeah. And sometimes I'll smash it
17:58
Speaker 1: against like something hard it and then hold the broken
18:01
Speaker 1: bottleneck in my hand and you can't tempt anyone to
18:04
Speaker 1: come at me. Yeah, you'll say, any takers. Uh, never
18:08
Speaker 1: had any takers either, he knows you never have. It's
18:10
Speaker 1: very menacing. What else we got. We got the purified
18:13
Speaker 1: water I was talking about. And this is when you're
18:15
Speaker 1: talking about the dissanis and the aquafinas. Is when they
18:18
Speaker 1: take public tap water uh and they purify it. It
18:23
Speaker 1: comes from in other words, of municipal water source. Uh.
18:27
Speaker 1: And that's pretty much the long and short of that.
18:30
Speaker 1: And I mean, if you're talking about pure water, this
18:32
Speaker 1: is like the most artificial water. It's the most heavily
18:35
Speaker 1: treated water, because yeah, you're taking tap water and then
18:39
Speaker 1: you're bottling it and selling it. And the FDA says, Okay,
18:41
Speaker 1: there's some things you have to do if you're selling
18:44
Speaker 1: purified water. It has to be if you're selling it
18:47
Speaker 1: from like a municipal source. Um. You you have to
18:51
Speaker 1: either filter it, you have to distill it. You have
18:53
Speaker 1: to run it through that old reverse osmosis. You have
18:56
Speaker 1: to take some oxygen and subjected to electricity and create
18:59
Speaker 1: ozone and then infuse the water with that. So it
19:02
Speaker 1: goes and reacts with all the stuff in there and
19:04
Speaker 1: and UM purifies it, or you could run it through
19:07
Speaker 1: UV light treatment or some combination of that. But that's
19:11
Speaker 1: what purified water is. And as a matter of fact,
19:13
Speaker 1: it didn't realize this chuck. But you can buy and
19:16
Speaker 1: I could not find what labels this was, but you
19:19
Speaker 1: can buy water that was originally nonpotable water, meaning like
19:22
Speaker 1: you should not be drinking this is not for human consumption.
19:25
Speaker 1: UM that can be treated through these these ways and
19:29
Speaker 1: it becomes it can be bottled and sold as purified
19:32
Speaker 1: water because the end result is the same. It's almost
19:34
Speaker 1: devoid of anything but water molecules. Yeah, and I think,
19:39
Speaker 1: and we'll get into the different f d A versus
19:41
Speaker 1: e p A standards, because e p A s who
19:43
Speaker 1: regulates your tap water. But I believe that e p
19:48
Speaker 1: A standard or the FDA standard for bottled water allows
19:52
Speaker 1: more poop in your water than the e p A
19:55
Speaker 1: does in your tap water. Right, Yeah, The e p
19:57
Speaker 1: A says you can have zero poop in your water,
19:59
Speaker 1: and the FDA says, hey, hey, this relax a little bit.
20:02
Speaker 1: Let's let's take our hang ups off of the American public.
20:05
Speaker 1: Oh man, what's wrong with a little poop in your water? Right? Uh,
20:09
Speaker 1: you've got spring water, which I love. Uh. There's nothing
20:13
Speaker 1: better than if you can drink directly from a spring
20:16
Speaker 1: when you're hiking in the woods, cupped in your hand,
20:20
Speaker 1: like Daniel Boone did. Just the best thing in the world.
20:23
Speaker 1: It comes from a protected underwater spring and it flows
20:28
Speaker 1: to the surface on its own. It just bubbles right
20:30
Speaker 1: up there. It's a really a wonderful sight to behold
20:32
Speaker 1: if you've never seen a natural spring. I love it.
20:35
Speaker 1: I love it. And then it's collected there at the
20:37
Speaker 1: surface in the case of bottling, or maybe they may
20:41
Speaker 1: drill down if they can't get, you know, to the surface,
20:45
Speaker 1: but it's like a sanitary, protected area that it's drilled
20:49
Speaker 1: down to where what's feeding the spring. Like they might
20:52
Speaker 1: just go to an area that's more accessible, I guess, uh.
20:55
Speaker 1: And then but if they do that, though, they have
20:58
Speaker 1: to have it has to be the same composition as
21:01
Speaker 1: as it does from the source. Yes, Hey, I'm gonna
21:04
Speaker 1: put three words together, and you try to convince me
21:07
Speaker 1: that they don't evoke an image of a future medical kink, sanitary,
21:12
Speaker 1: protected whole and that awful and then an awful collection
21:17
Speaker 1: of words. Uh yeah, it's uh yeah, that could be
21:22
Speaker 1: the album new album title for Diarrhea Planet. I guess so,
21:27
Speaker 1: but it's kind of the opposite of a diarrhea planet
21:29
Speaker 1: if you think about it. Yeah, I think that's the twist. Yeah, hey,
21:33
Speaker 1: diarrhea Planet. I hope you guys are still doing it.
21:36
Speaker 1: Uh so, then you got well water is the last
21:39
Speaker 1: one before we go to our break, and that comes
21:42
Speaker 1: from a well it does. Simple simple. It's a new one.
21:47
Speaker 1: I'm testing out because I've been using easy peasy too much.
21:50
Speaker 1: Did you just say simple fimple? Yeah, but really you could.
21:55
Speaker 1: You could make anything. You could use any consonant or
21:57
Speaker 1: combination for simple, pimp. That's kind of gross. You could
22:02
Speaker 1: say simple simple, I guess, but that's unnecessarily complex. I
22:07
Speaker 1: like easy beasy, lemon squeezy. Yeah, I do too, But again,
22:10
Speaker 1: it's it's starting to kind of take off a little bit,
22:13
Speaker 1: so I'm gonna go elsewhere. All right, simple simple, We'll
22:17
Speaker 1: be right back. Stuck stucks in. That sucks. I don't
22:21
Speaker 1: know that you know it. Stuck and Stuck. It's a
22:24
Speaker 1: great name. That's the name of it. It's a great name. Alright,
22:29
Speaker 1: Stucks net within with an X. I want to learn
22:33
Speaker 1: about a rosortic college act, how to take the perfect
22:35
Speaker 1: but with all about fractals, getting kiscon that's the hun
22:38
Speaker 1: the Lizzie Border murders that they kind of all runs
22:40
Speaker 1: on the plane everything we should know. Word up, Jerry. Alright, Chuck. So,
22:49
Speaker 1: like we said, the FDA regulates bottled water, and it's
22:52
Speaker 1: kind of a quirk of bureaucracy that it does. It
22:55
Speaker 1: would make way more sense that the e p A does,
22:57
Speaker 1: But the e p A says, no, we're too busy
23:00
Speaker 1: concentrating on drinking water and our standards. F DA, you
23:04
Speaker 1: go handle this, And the FDA says, that makes sense
23:06
Speaker 1: because we're going to consider bottled water a packaged food,
23:10
Speaker 1: which is I can't remember what episode we talked about
23:13
Speaker 1: it in, but that's why water has an expiration date
23:16
Speaker 1: because it's considered a package food, and all packaged foods
23:19
Speaker 1: have to have an expiration date, even though water is
23:22
Speaker 1: never really going to expire, right, So the FDA is
23:25
Speaker 1: in charge of regulating bottled water and they do a
23:28
Speaker 1: so so job of it. Yeah. I think the deal
23:31
Speaker 1: is is the f d A considers bottled water low
23:35
Speaker 1: the categorized as as low risk. Yeah, so just a presumption. Yeah,
23:41
Speaker 1: and I guess that I don't know. I guess that
23:44
Speaker 1: lets them internally off the hook for I mean, I'm
23:48
Speaker 1: sure surely it shouldn't be as robust as like pharmaceuticals
23:51
Speaker 1: or something. I'm not saying that, but uh, yeah, they
23:54
Speaker 1: categorize it as low risk. Uh they It says that
23:58
Speaker 1: it must come from a roof source. But that doesn't
24:02
Speaker 1: mean it's not like the f d A goes out
24:04
Speaker 1: to the spring in Tennessee or whatever to check it
24:07
Speaker 1: out or anything like that. Right, No, they definitely do not. They. Um,
24:11
Speaker 1: they say it has to come from you know, one
24:13
Speaker 1: of these like an archiesian well, it has to come
24:15
Speaker 1: from well water, it has to come from municipal water,
24:17
Speaker 1: like all those those sources that we mentioned. And by
24:21
Speaker 1: the way, right um, and by the way, you have
24:26
Speaker 1: to actually put on your label what kind of water
24:28
Speaker 1: this is? Like those aren't just like like you know,
24:31
Speaker 1: categories like those are terms that you will see on
24:34
Speaker 1: a bottled water label because by law, they have to
24:37
Speaker 1: say what kind of water, it is right. And and
24:40
Speaker 1: then further than that, like they have kind of sub
24:43
Speaker 1: regulations for the different kinds of water, Like if it's
24:46
Speaker 1: from a spring or something like that, Um, I think
24:50
Speaker 1: they they they has to be tested like once a
24:53
Speaker 1: week or something to make sure it's sanitary. Um. That's
24:56
Speaker 1: another one. If it comes from a from municipal water,
25:00
Speaker 1: it has to go through that filtrition process like we said. Um.
25:03
Speaker 1: And then also if you add anything to the water,
25:06
Speaker 1: because remember I was saying reverse osmosis chuck is like
25:09
Speaker 1: it takes everything out pure the water purification does well.
25:13
Speaker 1: They usually add some stuff in to give that water flavor. Again,
25:17
Speaker 1: if it's like that, say like they put they fortify
25:20
Speaker 1: it with protein molecules or chunks of fat or something
25:23
Speaker 1: like that. It's got to say in the label it
25:25
Speaker 1: contains chunks of fat or with ad fat is probably
25:28
Speaker 1: how the marketing team would want them to say it.
25:32
Speaker 1: And like a starburst you know on the label. Uh. Interestingly,
25:37
Speaker 1: fluoride is uh. When we did an episode on Florida
25:41
Speaker 1: that was jeez, I feel like one of our earlier
25:43
Speaker 1: year one or two episodes definitely the fluoridation of our
25:46
Speaker 1: drinking water in the United States, um bottled water is
25:49
Speaker 1: not fluoridated, so uh. Some dentists have talked about the
25:54
Speaker 1: fact that if you only drink bottled water in your house,
25:57
Speaker 1: then you're avoiding that fluoridation that they think you need
26:00
Speaker 1: to make your teeth strong. Yeah, so if they if
26:03
Speaker 1: it's bottled water with added fluoride, like I think a
26:05
Speaker 1: lot of baby water, that's the thing. Is there baby water? Yeah?
26:09
Speaker 1: I think there's like Gerber bottled water for babies and
26:12
Speaker 1: stuff like that. I think those things usually have added fluoride.
26:15
Speaker 1: But it's gonna say it on the on the label.
26:17
Speaker 1: If you don't see on the label with added fluoride
26:19
Speaker 1: or something like that, that's not a thing. Why has
26:22
Speaker 1: no one, I'm sure this will happen at some point.
26:25
Speaker 1: Why has no one tried to collect rainwater and market
26:29
Speaker 1: that as like, you know, Icelandic rainwater bottled up. I
26:33
Speaker 1: would bet you a hundred dollars someone has you think?
26:37
Speaker 1: Sure gotta be because I was thinking, like when I said, like,
26:42
Speaker 1: what other water sources are there? Obviously there's the ocean
26:44
Speaker 1: and stuff like that, but it's like, well, I guess
26:47
Speaker 1: there's rainwater, and why hasn't someone you know touted that
26:51
Speaker 1: as like the next big thing. I mean, it's supposed
26:53
Speaker 1: to be some of the purest water you can get
26:55
Speaker 1: your hands on is rainwater, which is surprising but true.
26:59
Speaker 1: They don't know because it's come out of the sky,
27:01
Speaker 1: and the sky is poisoned all of us obviously, Yeah,
27:04
Speaker 1: you would call it though, you call it skywater s
27:06
Speaker 1: k y e with like an um loud over everything. Right. Um.
27:14
Speaker 1: I hope it didn't give someone an idea. I again,
27:17
Speaker 1: I think somebody's probably done that, all right. So the
27:20
Speaker 1: FDA also says there's just certain amounts of stuff you
27:23
Speaker 1: can have it there. Again, poop, you can have a
27:25
Speaker 1: certain amount of poop, bacteria, virus, is, parasites, you can
27:29
Speaker 1: have a certain amount of raid on in there. You're
27:31
Speaker 1: gonna have a certain amount of lead in there. That's actually,
27:33
Speaker 1: that's actually right. That's actually one place where the f
27:36
Speaker 1: d A exceeds the e p A standards is with lead.
27:40
Speaker 1: The FDA says you have to have a much lower
27:43
Speaker 1: amount of lead in your bottled water than the FDA
27:46
Speaker 1: allows for because the or the e p A allows
27:49
Speaker 1: for in tap water. Because a lot of the pipes
27:52
Speaker 1: in the United States have lead in them, and supposedly
27:56
Speaker 1: as long as your local water supply is not over
28:00
Speaker 1: chlorinated or being overtreated, that the water won't corrode the
28:05
Speaker 1: lead and very little lead will be brought to your tap.
28:09
Speaker 1: So the e p A says, some leads going to
28:11
Speaker 1: be in your water just by virtue of flowing through
28:13
Speaker 1: these pipes. And the FDA says, well, this stuff is
28:17
Speaker 1: not supposed to be flowing through pipes, or if it
28:19
Speaker 1: did flow through pipes, it has to be so so
28:21
Speaker 1: well filtered that there there should be almost no lead
28:24
Speaker 1: in it whatsoever. But other than that, the e p
28:27
Speaker 1: A usually beats the f d A. Right, Yeah, and
28:30
Speaker 1: then you know this is the federal standards. Then your
28:33
Speaker 1: different state and may or may not have h state
28:36
Speaker 1: regulations for the industry. Uh. Some states don't have anything
28:39
Speaker 1: at all going on. Some states are going to be
28:42
Speaker 1: a little more strict obviously, uh, and say like you
28:44
Speaker 1: have to have a license, you have to submit to
28:48
Speaker 1: inspections of that kind of thing. Um. So if you're
28:51
Speaker 1: you know, if you're out there thinking what is one
28:53
Speaker 1: to do, then it sounds like the wild West. There
28:56
Speaker 1: is a voluntary body, the International Bottled Water Association, UH,
29:03
Speaker 1: The good news is is that I believe, and this
29:07
Speaker 1: is an old number, but I bet it's still pretty
29:09
Speaker 1: accurate that about of the bottled water in the US
29:15
Speaker 1: is a member of the i b w A and
29:17
Speaker 1: they have their own internal, like self enforced regulations as
29:21
Speaker 1: far as you know, it's called I believe the i
29:24
Speaker 1: w B A model code. Uh. And you know they
29:27
Speaker 1: talk about, you know, all the filtration types and all
29:30
Speaker 1: the disinfecting that you have to do and stuff like that. Yeah,
29:33
Speaker 1: and like really they really stepped up their game with
29:36
Speaker 1: the Let's get the poop out campaign of two thousand
29:39
Speaker 1: thirteen really had a big effect on the industry. Right.
29:43
Speaker 1: But to be clear, this is not like a body
29:45
Speaker 1: that like impostes fines or stuff like that. It's all
29:48
Speaker 1: just sort of self regulated and voluntary. Yeah. It's like,
29:52
Speaker 1: um ooh, man, what episode we're talking about where it's like,
29:54
Speaker 1: I have a feeling this is the industry getting out
29:56
Speaker 1: ahead of a problem, like problem legislation that's going to
30:00
Speaker 1: make them do stuff. I remember, I don't either, but
30:03
Speaker 1: I have a feelings. And I think anytime you see
30:05
Speaker 1: an industry coming up with its own voluntary regulations, it's
30:08
Speaker 1: a lot of um, uh pr stuff, you know what
30:13
Speaker 1: I mean. I did, but they I mean, they do
30:18
Speaker 1: have these standards and they do have um, you know,
30:22
Speaker 1: certification you can get through them. Um. But yeah, again,
30:27
Speaker 1: it's it's voluntary. And like you said, like if if
30:31
Speaker 1: you are not selling water from state to state, technically
30:34
Speaker 1: the FDA does not have jurisdiction over you as long
30:38
Speaker 1: as you're only selling within your state's boundaries, as long
30:41
Speaker 1: as the source of this water comes entirely from within
30:44
Speaker 1: that state's boundaries. And then if that state is one
30:46
Speaker 1: of those I think seven or eleven states that don't
30:49
Speaker 1: regulate bottled water, there's no one looking over your shoulder whatsoever.
30:55
Speaker 1: Your water is totally unregulated. It falls in a weird
30:58
Speaker 1: little loophole like what that part in Yellowstone Park that
31:02
Speaker 1: supposedly has no laws on it or whatever. That's kind
31:05
Speaker 1: of like that situation. But then I saw that there's
31:08
Speaker 1: a way that the FDA can still get you if
31:11
Speaker 1: your packaging was made in another state, any part of it.
31:15
Speaker 1: You're now subject to full FDA oversight for your bottle
31:18
Speaker 1: of water, interstate uh whatever, packaging. Yeah, I guess so
31:24
Speaker 1: should we. I think we should talk about leaching some
31:27
Speaker 1: because I feel like leaching is something that is kind
31:32
Speaker 1: of just started to come around in the past like
31:34
Speaker 1: six or seven years, which is the idea that wait
31:38
Speaker 1: a minute, we have all this bottle water stored in
31:40
Speaker 1: the garage, cases and cases of it stored in our
31:43
Speaker 1: hot garage in Arizona. Is that bad for you? And
31:48
Speaker 1: the answers is yes, it is. Uh. Leeching happens the
31:52
Speaker 1: you know, we can, we'll get into all the different
31:54
Speaker 1: kinds of plastics, but um, mainly what you're gonna find
31:59
Speaker 1: is polycarbonate. You're gonna find PVC, and you're gonna find
32:04
Speaker 1: polly styrene. And you know, back in the day, there
32:10
Speaker 1: were some people that said, like, oh, it's really fine,
32:12
Speaker 1: it's no big deal. Other people would say, well, we're
32:14
Speaker 1: really not sure. And other people would say, no, if
32:17
Speaker 1: you heat up a bottle that has uh, how's it
32:20
Speaker 1: pronounced thay lates, th lights, lights, thals, p h t
32:29
Speaker 1: h A l a t e s, everyone knows what
32:31
Speaker 1: those are. Um that it's it's gonna be leaching chemicals
32:35
Speaker 1: into your water, especially if it stays warm, especially if
32:40
Speaker 1: it's stored for a long long time. And I read
32:42
Speaker 1: recently and this is something I would do if I, uh,
32:45
Speaker 1: if I like had to get a bottle of water
32:47
Speaker 1: like in a pinch like I was talking about, I
32:49
Speaker 1: would say, all right, at least I'm gonna keep this
32:51
Speaker 1: bottle and like refill it for as long as possible. Uh.
32:54
Speaker 1: They said that that's not a good thing to do either,
32:56
Speaker 1: because multiple reuses will encourage leaching, which I didn't know, right,
33:01
Speaker 1: So did you mention the two eighteen study at all? Not?
33:06
Speaker 1: So this this article, this is like a little time
33:09
Speaker 1: capsule because chuck in it. They quote a guy from
33:13
Speaker 1: the PG Research Foundation who basically says, it's all good,
33:17
Speaker 1: We're fine. And I went and looked it up. I'm like,
33:20
Speaker 1: that sounds really fishy. Where they get their funding? What
33:22
Speaker 1: is the PG stand for? Their defunct They came along
33:27
Speaker 1: in just long enough to tell everybody that plastic was fine,
33:30
Speaker 1: and now they're defunct, so it's even fishier. I couldn't
33:32
Speaker 1: find any funding stuff like that. But since then, um,
33:36
Speaker 1: that suspicion that now there's some sort of like leaching
33:40
Speaker 1: going on and that's probably bad for us has finally
33:42
Speaker 1: been quantified. There's a two thou eighteen study in Frontiers
33:46
Speaker 1: and Chemistry and in the study, two fifty nine different
33:50
Speaker 1: bottle water sold in eleven different countries were tested, and
33:54
Speaker 1: then what they found is like, of no surprise whatsoever
33:59
Speaker 1: had micro plastics in them. And I suspect the other
34:02
Speaker 1: seven percent, like they screwed up the testing, Like I
34:05
Speaker 1: can't believe it's not a hundred percent of these bottle
34:07
Speaker 1: waters have a microplastics. Yeah, this is uh. If you
34:12
Speaker 1: want to read the original article, it's really good. It's
34:14
Speaker 1: from Time magazine. Your bottle water probably has plastic in it?
34:18
Speaker 1: Should you worry? By markham Hyde. I guess, And it's
34:23
Speaker 1: from May of twenty nineteen, and yeah, it's definitely. It's
34:26
Speaker 1: definitely good to see like a real source in a
34:29
Speaker 1: real study and not just a defunct organization. That's like
34:32
Speaker 1: that's pretty good. Yeah, it's fine, don't worry about it.
34:35
Speaker 1: So in this um they found that there's a substantial
34:38
Speaker 1: amount of microplastics. And this's not like little trace amounts.
34:41
Speaker 1: Remember like the parts per million or parts per billion
34:45
Speaker 1: of some of the stuff that the f D A
34:47
Speaker 1: H and E p A allows in bottle water and
34:50
Speaker 1: tap water. The average among these two nine bottle waters
34:54
Speaker 1: was three D and twenty five particles per leader of microplastics. Yeah,
34:59
Speaker 1: that's seems like a lot. Okay, if that seems like
35:02
Speaker 1: a lot, buckling for this one. Nestlee Pure Life bottled
35:05
Speaker 1: water had an average of ten thousand particles per leader
35:10
Speaker 1: of microplastics. You might say, okay, let's fine and get
35:14
Speaker 1: a little plastic in my teeth, like pull it out,
35:16
Speaker 1: it's fine. Um, microplastics are becoming uh, it's becoming clear
35:23
Speaker 1: that microplastics are probably endocrine disruptors. I think they fall
35:29
Speaker 1: into a class called obeseagen's and polypropylene in particular seems
35:34
Speaker 1: to be an endoc endocrine disruptor. And you'll never guess
35:37
Speaker 1: what our bottled water, what type of plastic our bottled
35:40
Speaker 1: water bottles are made out of? That? Yes, polypropylene. So
35:45
Speaker 1: this seems to be one of those things where everybody's like, yeah,
35:48
Speaker 1: we don't understand it, so it's probably fine. And now
35:52
Speaker 1: we're finally getting to the science where it's like, man,
35:55
Speaker 1: microplastics are really screwing us up. And even worse than
35:58
Speaker 1: just being in our bottled water, they're everywhere. Like we
36:02
Speaker 1: have a an episode do where we just talk about microplastics. Okay, yeah,
36:08
Speaker 1: we'll take a break here. In a sec. But I
36:09
Speaker 1: think to set us up for the next part, which
36:11
Speaker 1: is the environmental nightmare, which is just the bottles themselves,
36:15
Speaker 1: like after you drink it in the environment, because we're
36:17
Speaker 1: talking about like drinking the water itself. Uh, And we'll
36:21
Speaker 1: get into the nightmare of after you've had that water
36:24
Speaker 1: in the single use plastic aspect in a sec after
36:27
Speaker 1: the break. But microplastics I read basically that plastic water
36:32
Speaker 1: bottles don't break down at all. When they say like, oh,
36:36
Speaker 1: it takes some five years to break down, they don't
36:39
Speaker 1: break down. They basically say that they just break apart
36:41
Speaker 1: in the microplastics, and that microplastic ironically will end up
36:45
Speaker 1: in the water supply, which could ensure one day that
36:49
Speaker 1: we can only drink things like bottled water because there's
36:52
Speaker 1: so much microplastic in the water supply on the plastic
36:55
Speaker 1: water bottles that people drank that never break down. Isn't
36:58
Speaker 1: that amazing full circles, such a beautiful circle of life
37:01
Speaker 1: that we've got going on? All Right, we'll take that
37:04
Speaker 1: break and we'll we'll talk more about single use plastic
37:08
Speaker 1: and why that's such a problem. Right for this stuck
37:11
Speaker 1: stuck in home, I don't know that you know it.
37:13
Speaker 1: Stuck in this it's a great name. That's the name
37:19
Speaker 1: of it. It's a great name, alright, stuck within with
37:22
Speaker 1: an X I want to learn about as how to
37:26
Speaker 1: take a perfect but with all about fractals and kiscon
37:29
Speaker 1: that's the hun the Lizzie Border murders that they kind
37:31
Speaker 1: of all runs on the plane everything that we should know.
37:37
Speaker 1: No word up, Jerry, Okay, Chuck. So we're talking about
37:41
Speaker 1: single use plastic, which means you take a bottled water,
37:46
Speaker 1: you drink the water, and then you just toss the
37:48
Speaker 1: plastic bottle. Apparently, if we've come a long way in recycling,
37:53
Speaker 1: it used to be something like ten percent of bottled
37:55
Speaker 1: water bottles were recycled back when this article was first written.
37:59
Speaker 1: Now we're up to all my in the US, uh,
38:02
Speaker 1: specifically because Norway recycles of their plastic okay, and then
38:08
Speaker 1: so part of the problem with that, if you'll remember
38:10
Speaker 1: back to our Recycle Update episode, China recently said, you
38:16
Speaker 1: know what, you can take all your dirty plastic bottles
38:19
Speaker 1: and shove them because we're not going to recycle them
38:21
Speaker 1: for you anymore, which is a big problem because recycling
38:24
Speaker 1: plastic can be actually fairly expensive. In China was basically
38:28
Speaker 1: the world's plastic recycler for a long time. So now
38:32
Speaker 1: people are trying to figure out how to how to
38:35
Speaker 1: handle this issue, which has now become even more pronounced um.
38:39
Speaker 1: And that's kind of where we are right now, while
38:41
Speaker 1: America is at the same time in the world, frankly
38:44
Speaker 1: stepping up to UM use even more plastic water bottles
38:48
Speaker 1: than ever. Yeah, there is one alternative that I've seen
38:53
Speaker 1: being used here and there. It's corn based. It's called
38:56
Speaker 1: p l A or pole. It's made from polylactic acid uh,
39:00
Speaker 1: and it is biodegradable, uh, compostable three months to degrade
39:05
Speaker 1: in a compost pile. But here's the fine print. It
39:08
Speaker 1: sounds great, and I saw that, you know, a major
39:11
Speaker 1: fancy schmancy hotel chain, you know, made the big switch
39:14
Speaker 1: and had made a big to do about this. It like,
39:17
Speaker 1: now we use corn bass and it's compostable, but it's
39:19
Speaker 1: only compostable if you compost it. And even the head
39:23
Speaker 1: of the hotel chain was like, yeah, we found that
39:26
Speaker 1: very little actually makes it to the compost pile. UM,
39:30
Speaker 1: So it's not it's not recyclable, like if you throw
39:33
Speaker 1: it in the recycling p l A will mess up
39:37
Speaker 1: and it doesn't even take much for it to to
39:39
Speaker 1: really mess up the uh, the other kinds of plastic
39:42
Speaker 1: that they're recycling. So they just dump it all and yeah,
39:46
Speaker 1: I mean exactly, and or they try and sending it
39:49
Speaker 1: on a boat to China and that's a long long way.
39:51
Speaker 1: That's an environmental nightmare. So you know, be aware if
39:54
Speaker 1: you see corn based biodegradable plastic. Uh, unless you know,
39:59
Speaker 1: you really take it upon yourself to compost it, then
40:01
Speaker 1: you're you're doing the right thing, good for you. But
40:04
Speaker 1: very it says, very little of this stuff ever makes
40:06
Speaker 1: it to the compost. Yes, so there's like fifty of
40:09
Speaker 1: our of our previous episode just hanging around here, like
40:14
Speaker 1: our episode on soda or episode I'm recycling, or episode
40:17
Speaker 1: and composting, our episode on plastics, remember the Great Pacific
40:20
Speaker 1: garbage patch we talked about plastic never breaking down. That's all.
40:24
Speaker 1: They're all showing up for a friendly hello, our episode
40:27
Speaker 1: on diarrhea Planet. That's right, which, by the way, we
40:31
Speaker 1: should just explain real quick. Oh, there's probably a lot
40:33
Speaker 1: of people they're like, what are you talking about? Because
40:35
Speaker 1: it was a random reference years ago. They're a band,
40:37
Speaker 1: Diarrhea Planet, and they're great, and I'm a big fan,
40:40
Speaker 1: and I just always thought that they should change their name.
40:43
Speaker 1: So that's why we're It's a callback from years ago,
40:45
Speaker 1: and I think you should fill them in in case
40:47
Speaker 1: they don't stumble across the episode where that appeared. And
40:49
Speaker 1: what did you say they should change their name to. Yeah,
40:54
Speaker 1: I don't know what brought the whole thing up. Frozen
40:56
Speaker 1: poop knife. Oh, that's right. You remember somebody made a
41:00
Speaker 1: knife out of the poop and killed a bear or
41:02
Speaker 1: an interloper or like an evil brother in law. I
41:06
Speaker 1: don't know, And that's what brought the whole thing up. Yeah,
41:09
Speaker 1: they're great though, they're they're from Nashville, and uh, I
41:12
Speaker 1: don't know that we've ever heard from them, but that
41:14
Speaker 1: we did, they rejected our publicly, our suggestion publicly on Twitter.
41:20
Speaker 1: All right, Yeah, man, I gotta fill you in on
41:23
Speaker 1: the last thirteen years. You're you're getting blank. So just
41:28
Speaker 1: to kind of button this up about the single use plastic,
41:30
Speaker 1: like it is a problem everybody and it's just one
41:33
Speaker 1: of those things like our trash also did a landfill
41:36
Speaker 1: episode that we just kind of put out of sight.
41:39
Speaker 1: And out of mind. But that doesn't mean it just
41:40
Speaker 1: disappears and goes away. So fortunately, one of the things
41:43
Speaker 1: that a lot of people are thinking of who think
41:46
Speaker 1: about this kind of stuff is something that has made
41:49
Speaker 1: sense for a long time. But in our Littering episode,
41:53
Speaker 1: we talked about how there was a huge corporate push
41:56
Speaker 1: to basically say, you're the litter bug. You the person
41:59
Speaker 1: using it. We the people who are making this plastic
42:02
Speaker 1: packaging and who are um using it to sell you
42:05
Speaker 1: our products, and it's not our fault. Finally, finally, some
42:09
Speaker 1: people in legislatures are calling bs on that, and there's
42:12
Speaker 1: something called extended producer responsibility laws. Yeah, me too. Uh,
42:18
Speaker 1: they're thinking of them in Washington State, Maine, and Michigan,
42:22
Speaker 1: and it basically says you have to figure out, like
42:26
Speaker 1: you are responsible for dealing with the packaging waste that
42:30
Speaker 1: your product is solding. You don't just get to walk
42:33
Speaker 1: away from it. And I think they're trying to figure
42:35
Speaker 1: out how to make that happen. But the fact that
42:37
Speaker 1: they're even talking about this stuff is another example that
42:41
Speaker 1: we're starting to wake up. Finally, that's amazing, that's cool.
42:46
Speaker 1: I think of hearing that I do too, Chuck. Will
42:49
Speaker 1: it make a difference. Stay tuned. I should shout out
42:55
Speaker 1: my friends film. By the way, I just realized, like
42:57
Speaker 1: Dave's one of my very best friends. Uh, you want
43:00
Speaker 1: to watch that documentary. It's very eye opening. Uh. And
43:03
Speaker 1: it is called Flint The Poisoning of an American City. Uh.
43:07
Speaker 1: And boy, if you want to, if you want your
43:09
Speaker 1: eyes opened about you know, the fact that it can
43:12
Speaker 1: be you know that you're in the twenties and that
43:15
Speaker 1: we're still just like pumping poison water to a to
43:19
Speaker 1: a town astounding rates, then you should check it out. Yeah,
43:24
Speaker 1: I'm going to check that one out. I'll bet it's good.
43:27
Speaker 1: It sounds blood boiling. What about the taste of bottled water,
43:31
Speaker 1: because that's sort of the one thing we haven't really
43:33
Speaker 1: covered is some people say they like the taste more,
43:36
Speaker 1: and you know, they're certainly haven't been very scientific studies,
43:40
Speaker 1: but there have been random like things and and stuff
43:45
Speaker 1: like that where they will, uh, they will do like
43:48
Speaker 1: blind taste tests, and it depends on where you are, obviously,
43:51
Speaker 1: and I think a lot of these have happened in
43:53
Speaker 1: New York. But yeah, unfair, yeah, because they have good water,
43:56
Speaker 1: but in blind taste tests. It seems like a lot
43:58
Speaker 1: of times that people either can't tell the difference or
44:02
Speaker 1: they rate tap water kind of higher than they ordinarily
44:05
Speaker 1: would if it was labeled as such. Yeah, I think
44:08
Speaker 1: depending on how um gross your tap water tastes, or
44:14
Speaker 1: how much you're into mineral water, um taste can be
44:17
Speaker 1: a factor. Like if you don't want your water taste
44:20
Speaker 1: at all, go get yourself some purified water and call
44:23
Speaker 1: it a day. Or if you if your tap water
44:26
Speaker 1: is pretty bland and you like a little taste to it,
44:28
Speaker 1: you might want some mineral water, sparkling mineral water. Who knows, right,
44:32
Speaker 1: So taste is probably the one thing that you can say, Yeah,
44:35
Speaker 1: that might actually be a factor, um, but not always
44:39
Speaker 1: a lot of people choose tapwater and blind taste tests
44:42
Speaker 1: like you were talking about. Yeah, I saw a water
44:45
Speaker 1: Somalia in New York. Oh, I've I've seen that guy?
44:49
Speaker 1: Did you see that? It was? I think? Why do
44:52
Speaker 1: I want to say? It was that TV show that
44:53
Speaker 1: uh Zach? What's his face? Who's the hunky guy? I
44:58
Speaker 1: think all all guy's name is Zach or hunky Za Galivanakis. Yeah,
45:03
Speaker 1: he's example he really always been hunky. I can't remember
45:08
Speaker 1: the zac Efron Uh, he has that show and if
45:10
Speaker 1: I'm not mistaken, he sat down with the water Somalia Uh,
45:15
Speaker 1: and it was it was really interesting. I mean it's
45:17
Speaker 1: very easy to scoff at something like that, but water
45:20
Speaker 1: are different kinds of water for sure, have different flavor
45:22
Speaker 1: profiles and um, and it's interesting to sit down and
45:27
Speaker 1: sort of listen to someone walk you through that. I
45:29
Speaker 1: don't know if I would go to the water Cafe
45:31
Speaker 1: or wherever this was that they were doing this, but um,
45:35
Speaker 1: I just found it interesting. It is interesting. It's like
45:38
Speaker 1: the water Boy. Remember that that movie with Adam Sandler.
45:41
Speaker 1: Sure he had that magic water that just tasted amazing. Yeah,
45:45
Speaker 1: my brother is on record, is uh. It's very characteristic
45:49
Speaker 1: of him as saying that his favorite water is hose water. Yeah,
45:52
Speaker 1: hose water is pretty good, have that nice rubber taste. Yeah.
45:56
Speaker 1: I think he's being serious too, and I think it
45:58
Speaker 1: evokes uh uh, you know childhood stuff when you're outside
46:02
Speaker 1: playing and having like a water hose fight. Then you
46:06
Speaker 1: drink some of that stuff. Yeah, the added sensation of
46:09
Speaker 1: like that slight sting because it's coming out a little
46:11
Speaker 1: faster than you wanted to, or is a spider perhaps
46:14
Speaker 1: gonna come out right. So there are some people who
46:19
Speaker 1: are like, hey, hey, this is all fun and games
46:21
Speaker 1: to to poop poo Americans over use of bottled water
46:24
Speaker 1: and everything. There are plenty of places that don't have
46:27
Speaker 1: access to clean drinking water, and in that sense, bottle
46:30
Speaker 1: of water is literally a lifesaver. Um. There's nobody arguing
46:34
Speaker 1: that or denying that. I think what people are saying
46:37
Speaker 1: is like, look, if you live in America, your tap water,
46:40
Speaker 1: for the most part, with some um some places shamefully accepted,
46:44
Speaker 1: is probably as healthy, taste, probably as good, and as
46:49
Speaker 1: roughly as pure as the bottled water that you're paying
46:53
Speaker 1: hundreds to maybe thousands of times more for, you know,
46:57
Speaker 1: drop for drop, and is having far less of an
47:00
Speaker 1: ecological um impact than your bottled water is your little
47:05
Speaker 1: bottled water habit. And I think that makes sense, and
47:08
Speaker 1: that certainly was a sensible thing to say in two
47:10
Speaker 1: thousand five. But there are people who who say, Okay,
47:14
Speaker 1: maybe we don't do bottled water. I get that because
47:16
Speaker 1: I'm concerned about microplastics. I also realized it's an ecological nightmare.
47:20
Speaker 1: But I don't know that it's a good idea to say,
47:23
Speaker 1: everybody just drink water out of the tap, and what
47:25
Speaker 1: they point to is the Safe Drinking Water Act from
47:29
Speaker 1: the seventies. I believe. I think Ironized Cody really had
47:33
Speaker 1: an impact on that one um and then it was
47:36
Speaker 1: updated and then that was it. And since then our
47:40
Speaker 1: science of oh, what's this thing in the water we
47:42
Speaker 1: didn't notice before that we said was fine, maybe we
47:45
Speaker 1: should start studying that. Oh it turns out it gives
47:47
Speaker 1: you bladder cancer? Or how is it okay to have
47:50
Speaker 1: chlorine in your water really even in small amounts? Like,
47:53
Speaker 1: all of this research just is happening, and more of
47:56
Speaker 1: it needs to happen. But just as much Congress these
48:00
Speaker 1: to say, hey, scientists, what have you been finding out
48:02
Speaker 1: about water that we're drinking? Since let's update the laws.
48:06
Speaker 1: Because the municipal tap water can be within those those
48:11
Speaker 1: those quotas or limits set by the Safe Drinking Water Act.
48:16
Speaker 1: That doesn't mean it's actually safe. It just means that
48:18
Speaker 1: from what Congress has set the limits for, it's safe.
48:22
Speaker 1: It's what Congress has said is safe. It's not necessarily
48:24
Speaker 1: scientifically safe. So we need to do more and more
48:27
Speaker 1: research on the water drinking because it's such a vitally
48:29
Speaker 1: important part of our world. Um, and it's pretty ridiculous
48:34
Speaker 1: that here in the United States that hasn't been updated
48:36
Speaker 1: for twenty five years. Yeah, and that would give you know,
48:40
Speaker 1: some Southern member of Congress to stand up and like
48:43
Speaker 1: beat their shoe on the desk and say these laws
48:47
Speaker 1: are as out data is an old water article on
48:51
Speaker 1: how stuff works. That was a great Trent Lot. Trent Lot. Yeah,
48:56
Speaker 1: is that guys still around? No? No, I'm just trying
49:00
Speaker 1: really hard to demonstrate how irrelevant and out of date
49:03
Speaker 1: we are. Oh. I thought I had something else to say,
49:07
Speaker 1: but now I can't think of it. Sorry, man, I
49:10
Speaker 1: didn't mean it, derail. No, No, I'm good. Well, if
49:12
Speaker 1: you want to know more about bottle water, you could
49:14
Speaker 1: do worse than checking out this anequated article on how
49:17
Speaker 1: stuff works. You can check out Serious Eats for some
49:20
Speaker 1: great history. We also got some search from yep, Time magazine,
49:25
Speaker 1: healthline all over the internet, and there is something called
49:28
Speaker 1: the Environmental Working Group. They have a tapwater database. It's awesome.
49:33
Speaker 1: You can go in, type in your zip code, select
49:35
Speaker 1: your water utility, and then just have the socks scared
49:38
Speaker 1: off of you when it reveals to you what's in
49:40
Speaker 1: your water? Checking out? I did that yesterday. I know
49:42
Speaker 1: what I was gonna say. Uh, you know the little
49:45
Speaker 1: um box water that they're doing now, is is a
49:48
Speaker 1: better alternative even than single use plastic? Oh yeah, the
49:51
Speaker 1: box water that sends you a check every month and
49:54
Speaker 1: the hopes that you'll mention them. You chill. It's not
49:57
Speaker 1: a brand, I don't think, is it? Yeah? Oh? Is
50:00
Speaker 1: it really? It's called box water, I believe. So Okay,
50:04
Speaker 1: I just meant water that's packaged in something that's uh
50:07
Speaker 1: not leaching plastic and it's easier to recycle. But I
50:10
Speaker 1: got you right? Do you know those boxes are made
50:13
Speaker 1: from baby lambs? Ah? What are you gonna do? Then? Nothing?
50:17
Speaker 1: You just give up? I guess all right. Well, since
50:20
Speaker 1: I said give up everybody, that means it's time for
50:22
Speaker 1: a listener mail. I'm clickity clicking, and I'm finding it.
50:29
Speaker 1: See I've got four good ones stored up here. Oh good.
50:34
Speaker 1: You know I'll do this one because this is uh
50:37
Speaker 1: promoting a documentary that I want to see another one. Hey, guys,
50:42
Speaker 1: love your show. Always thrilled it when a new episode
50:44
Speaker 1: pops up. My girlfriend and I both listened separately and
50:47
Speaker 1: together it was great to hear an entire episode dedicated
50:50
Speaker 1: to Wiseman's movie to the Cut Follies. Though any self
50:54
Speaker 1: respecting documentary filmmaker knows it well, it's a movie that
50:57
Speaker 1: many in the civilian world quote unquote don't. I'm surprised
51:00
Speaker 1: by how many people have never even heard of Gray Gardens. Anyway,
51:03
Speaker 1: been wanting to write for a while in hopes of
51:06
Speaker 1: turning you guys onto a movie that I made, and
51:09
Speaker 1: this recent Titticut Follies episode seemed to be the perfect excuse.
51:13
Speaker 1: It's called strad Style. It's a documentary about a rural
51:17
Speaker 1: Ohio gentleman with an obsession for strativeri the violin, of course, who,
51:24
Speaker 1: through the magic of social media, convinces a famous European
51:28
Speaker 1: concert violinists that he can make a copy of one
51:31
Speaker 1: of the most famous and valuable violins in the world.
51:34
Speaker 1: If you've ever seen and liked something like American Movie,
51:37
Speaker 1: I think you might dig this. Uh it was shot
51:40
Speaker 1: by the way that Strade Style has a shot in
51:43
Speaker 1: it that it is own that has an homage wink
51:46
Speaker 1: to Titticut Follies in it as well. And he sent
51:49
Speaker 1: me the trailer and uh it looks great. It looks
51:53
Speaker 1: like it did quite well in the festival circuit. It's
51:55
Speaker 1: like a real deal documentary and it's called Strade Style
51:58
Speaker 1: s t R a E made by listener and filmmaker,
52:03
Speaker 1: uh Stephen Abalos and go stream it. I'm gonna watch it.
52:07
Speaker 1: It looks really good. Same here. It does sound magnificent. Actually, yeah,
52:12
Speaker 1: it looks good. It looks right up my alley. Well,
52:14
Speaker 1: thanks Stephen or Stefan, depending on how you pronounce your name.
52:18
Speaker 1: Congratulations on your doc. That's a huge achievement and we're
52:22
Speaker 1: proud of you. We don't even know you, and we're
52:24
Speaker 1: proud of you. So thanks. Thanks for letting everybody know.
52:27
Speaker 1: Thanks to you Chuck for letting everybody know. If you
52:30
Speaker 1: want us to let everybody know, let us know via email.
52:34
Speaker 1: Send it off to stuff podcast at iHeart radio dot com.
52:40
Speaker 1: Stuff you Should Know is a production of iHeart Radio.
52:43
Speaker 1: For more podcasts my heart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app,
52:47
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.