Yeh the only thing you can drink is RO water at this point because plastic bottle water will just pump up your estrogen and other shit so 
I just use 8 step RO w mineralization added.
i see your point but Reverse Osmosis system has a lot of plastic parts in it as well.
really “plastic” is an umbrella term like “metal” …
you wouldn’t compare the health effects of ( poisonous ) Lead and Mercury to those of ( antimicrobial ) Silver for example or ( inert ) Gold and Platinum.
the 1 gallon bottles i get water in are made from HDPE which is in my estimate more like Gold / Platinum of plastics - that is to say, it is a fairly inert plastic in my understanding. though i haven’t really researched this.
basically the main damage from plastic food and water containers isn’t from the plastic itself but from the modifiers added to it.
for example the notorious BPA ( bisphenol ) is used to HARDEN plastic
while flexible plastics ( used to make water beds, flexible tubing etc ) use PLASTICIZERS which are added to base plastic to make it more flexible …
these additives leach out overtime causing the plastic to fail ( while also poisoning you ).
but HDPE doesn’t seem to have any major additives ( haven’t really researched ) and pretty much works forever. your milk jugs eventually get recycled into plastic decks with 25 year warranty. it is one of the longest lasting types of plastic. my understanding is HDPE properties are tuned by using various molecular weights rather than additives, but maybe it is both.
i don’t know why 1 gallon bottles are made from HDPE while other bottles are made from other plastics but HDPE has a feeling that is hard to mistake for anything else - it is translucent without being clear and it is kind of soft while also being basically indestructible. it is really a high performance plastic.
Actually i have a theory for why HDPE seems exclusive to 1 gallon bottles - it’s because 1 gallon bottles come in special cardboard boxes:
which is probably what allows a more malleable plastic to be used for the bottle itself versus 1 liter bottles that are typically just wrapped together but don’t get a cardboard box and thus need to be harder, forcing the use of different plastics.
I recycle both HDPE bottles and their cardboard boxes.
you also have to look at where the water in your are is coming from versus where your bottled water is coming from. in some cases filtering water may be the obvious choice if the tap water is already good to begin with. in New Jersey though we have downright unsafe to drink tap water whereas just 200 miles away ( i don’t get Poland spring - it’s some cheaper water from a more local source, but still away from toxic industrial activity ) there are clean springs in the mountains from which drinking water is bottled.
you also have to consider mounting options for the RO system as well.
as well as what kind of options you have for having water delivered.
i used RO in brooklyn but in NJ i’m using delivered 1 gallon bottles.
if i move to Florida maybe i will switch back to RO - who knows.
well in regards to BPA free nonsense what theyve done is switched a few chemicals around, called it BPS (which is exactly like BPA) and havent had a need to comply w BPA free nonsense since forever now
most metals we use in daily life are actually alloys. for example if you have an aluminum bicycle it isn’t actually made of pure aluminum. pure aluminum is very weak - as evidenced by aluminum foil used in the kitchen. bicycle frames are made from aluminum alloys.
most plastics are the same. the base plastic is usually unsuitable for the application without being modified in some way. BPA ( or whatever it was replaced with ) is such an additive.
but some metals ( like Chrome, Nickel or Platinum ) do not really require any alloying to function.
likewise some plastics also do not require any additives to perform.
i believe that HDPE is such a plastic, which is self-sufficient so to speak.
from Wikipedia:
The material [HDPE] has benefited from discussions about possible health and environmental problems caused by PVC and polycarbonate associated bisphenol A (BPA), as well as its advantages over glass, metal, and cardboard.
so you’re right that a plastic which required BPA as a hardener once BPA is removed will require a different hardener to function, which likely will be very similar …
same for plastics requiring plasticizers, UV stabilizers and so on …
but HDPE doesn’t seem to need anything …
i do not think that plastic is inherently THAT bad. all of the plumbing in modern houses is plastic ( PEX on supply side and PVC on the drain side ). your entire RO system is made out of PVC, most likely including the flexible tubing with plasticizers that leach into the water.
some plastics are obviously very bad while others are probably fairly OK as long as you keep them within operating parameters in terms of exposure to heat or ultraviolet light and so on.
and in any case you would probably be better off taking some estrogen blocker ( there are many and they are all very effective ) than trying to track down every single source of exposure to xenoestrogens in the environment ( which is likely impossible ).
your adipose tissue is in fact a major source of estrogen. which is probably why women prefer lean men.
go to a doctor, get your testosterone and estrogen measured. then dial them in to whatever levels you want. it will almost certainly get you further than avoiding bottled water.
of course you SHOULD avoid xenoestrogens and other toxins when it is practical to do so.
but we can’t avoid all exposure to everything that is harmful, and when we can it isn’t always practical or worth it.
So why did you switch from RO in BK to delivery service in NJ? are you renting or you found out its just easier to have it delivered? Also Ive used Big Berkey filters before RO - you should look into them.
1 - Installation
Brooklyn had formica laminate over particleboard countertop which is easy to drill a hole for the faucet in. It also had ample space for the tank under the sink.
NJ had granite countertop which is hard to drill and most of space under sink was occupied by food disposal. It would of course still be possible to install RO if i was determined to do it, but it was hassle enough to make me think of alternatives.
2 - Water Quality
In Brooklyn at the time i believed that NY had good quality tap water. Whether or not that was true is now irrelevant - it is what i believed at the time. I felt like a bit of polishing up is all that water needed so we started by filtering the water and then switched to RO.
in NJ we have some of the worst water in the country - literally over a hundred Federal Chemical and Nuclear waste sites that just drain into the water supply and everyone in NJ has cancer from drinking that water. This is because Edison and Tesla invented modern electricity here in NJ as well Einstein worked here in Princeton and so on - basically it was one of the earliest parts of the country to industrialize which ultimately ended up with it being the most polluted in terms of landfills and you have to basically be suicidal to drink tap water here.
it was actually Galen from Twitter who told me about it when we were debating whether NJ or Alaska was better. quite embarrassing that i had somebody from Alaska educate me about my own state of NJ. but i didn’t take his word for it - i googled that shit and it was true.
in other words i wouldn’t drink filtered NJ water. RO is not filtering - it removes basically everything - but i would still be nervous drinking literally radioactive waste even if it went through an RO system.
3 - Transport / Delivery options
you can’t carry water by hand - you can only buy it using a car or a truck. but there is nowhere to park in Brooklyn and then you have to take it through the elevator somehow and it is very bulky. in other words it just isn’t practical to buy bottled water in Brooklyn.
in NJ you just go to Costco or Sam’s Club or Shop Rite and throw the water in the trunk then unload at home.
But even then my car is a bit small for that - those 6-gallon packs at Costco / Sam’s club take up the trunk real quick and there is nowhere to put food and you then have to put it in the passenger compartment.
4 - “Pandemic”
when the “Pandemic” started stores ran out of water and i needed to drink so i called a water delivery company and asked if they still had water - they did ! So i set up monthly delivery which also solved my issue with running out of trunk space at Costco / Sam’s Club so when the Pandemic ended i simply continued to use water delivery because it was almost the same price as buying the water myself but without having to worry about how to fit giant boxes into the car …
one downside with delivered water is you will have to settle for whatever brand of water they got. i prefer the taste of Poland Spring or Nestle PureLife ( all local stores carry both ) but the company that delivers these has very low ratings ( according to reviews they miss deliveries, impossible to reach and so on ). the company i use has high ratings and good service ( they call if they’re about to miss delivery, reschedule, ask how many bottles you want and so on ) but they have their own brand of water and no other options. but they still list the source where the water comes from, which is in the mountains of Pennsylvania about 200 miles from here - so as long as it is from uninhabited mountainous region and not from industrialized NJ valley i am happy. And because this source is much closer than Maine where Poland Spring comes from they can save money on transportation and use these savings to offer better service.
fucking Chinese …
https://twitter.com/arthoefootjob/status/1626189198897078273?s=20
rest assured any Chinese food or cosmetics products are subject to the same high standards
hahaha nice
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