Is Precipitation Healthy To Drink?

Which is healthier to drink, Rain/Snow/Precipitation or Pond/Lake/River water?

 

Okay, you said rain water in your area. I have always heard about acid rain, that means the drinking of urban city rain areas can be problematic, right?

 

I think the rain water here would be okay, but if you lived in an urban or industrial area you might have to worry about acid rain. Lots of people have a rain catchment system at their house but I think a lot of people just use it to water their garden and not for drinking.

 

It is more a matter of location and what pollutants are in the various sources you listed if any. Pond is probably going to be last on most lists because a pond is often stagnant water. Where are you thinking of being when the need arises? Collecting and boiling is often going to be a needed step from any source, but it may not be the only step needed to make it safe. The water may need the addition of halogens or some rudimentary filtering in addition to boiling. The bottom line is to pick the least polluted of the sources you listed for your area and go from there.

 

No, most running tap water in major industrialized nations throughout Europe and North America is safe to drink unfiltered. Please don't buy into the propaganda that water bottlers like Perier spent so much money spreading about city water supplies to increase their sales. Bottled water is great to stockpile for emergency use and filters are good to have on hand for disasters that could affect the water supply, but they aren't all that nessacary for daily use under normal circumstances. Do the environment and your budget a favor, don't be paranoid and use a refillable container. Save emergency supplies for emergencies.

 

Most rain water is really safe to drink as it does provide a solution for most of the world. However, you have to be aware of the levels of pollution. You don't want to drink that water if near toxic areas like power plants or if it's come off of buildings like in puddles; that could potentially lead to more toxicity because of the surfaces it moves through. Usually for rain water it is actually lower than the public drinking supply of water in most areas. If properly treated-meaning boiled and filtered, you will be fine. Snow can also be used if treated. I have also ready that some people even harvest rainwater for various activities like washing clothes, mopping and laundry.

 

Rain/Snow/Precipitation themselves are all safe. It's how you collect that water that could lead to issues, a good example was collecting rain water from the roof of your house which is dirty. As for lakes and rivers, it depends on where you are but in general the further away from permanent residence the lake/river is, the safer it is.

Once again I'll throw this into the water discussion: how do you think human beings survived for thousands of years? Did Evian send water bottles back through time travel? Or did people maybe just drink from natural sources? So you don't really need to worry about nature messing with your water, just us humans and our dirty ways that pose a problem.

 

If you watch that movie called "Approaching The Unknown", the guy in the space ship that was going to Mars so he could colonize it for the first time, he messed up his internal water supply by doing something stupid, he had no choice but to figure out a way to create a water source.

He did so by taking the plants he was growing in the ship, put then in a container, cover it with some kind of plastic, and let the area in the container precipitate, which he directed it to pour inside of a cup. That was his water source for quite some time. He lived off of precipitation.

 

I have posted in another thread about gathering the morning dew. That precipitation is one of the cleanest water you can find. Water in the waterway like rivers and streams cannot be trusted especially when there are people in the vicinity. We had been to a forest near the city where there is a waterfalls with water that obviously has soap suds. The caretaker said that there is a residential area upstream and the residents were washing clothes in the river that leads to the waterfalls. So for me, rainwater is good for drinking and also snow.

 

What about condensation? Is that a safe route if there is no rain? I know it would be slow and limited, just wondering about the safety.

 

I think snow water is probably the cleanest if you take it from the top and the area you're in doesn't suffer from pollution or high wind speeds. I think rain water is probably not that healthy because I've read it comes down with dust on it, which makes is not good for your system if you don't filter it.

 

I think if your in a rural area filtered rain water would be best. Unless you live near a spring with clean water this is the best you can do. Those life straws seem to come in handy I think using these with rain water will give you some of the cleanest water you can get. As far as acid rain that's something to be concerned about and I don't know if acid can be filtered out of water effectively. The best thing to do if you live in a urban are is store an emergency supply of water.

 

I was thinking that snow had to be a good pure form of water. Even as children we never got sick from eating pure white snow but I must say collecting dew is new to me. How would you go about this?

 

Hi, I'm a science person and teacher-when I want to be, so I try to make things as simple as possible. In its simplest form, nature uses evaporation to make clouds and condensation to make rain. Water serves its purpose by cycling around and then being released back into both ground and air. Well, once the water evaporates and you are able to collect the condensation, it does remove most of the impurities but you still need to use heating or cooling methods to make it way more drinkable. You can even distill some of the so called undrinkable forms, preferably through heat if possible for better results.

 

A little over the top there on the explanation, I'm not a grade school student I'm a 40 year old working on a masters degree, but thank you.

 

Hmm, interesting. You are more than welcome. Not sure my post is condescending or demeaning in any way, so definitely didn't mean for you to take it that way. We are all here to learn and help as well as gain knowledge and insight from one another. Btw, I have two Master's degrees. With the post, I just saw it as a clarifying moment in response to your question. I try to be as detailed as possible because when asked a question, I try to be thorough so as not to cause confusion.

 

I don't know if it would always be safe to drink rainwater in an unprocessed state. There are so may be many pollutants in the atmosphere at any given time and I am considering that some of the substances may be entangled in the rain water. Therefore, I believe that there should be some form of purification before its drinkable.

 

And don't forget there are other people here reading who DON'T have two Master's degrees, and we are learning by reading here too. Just because he knows something doesn't mean I do, and I am reading to learn also. You two having conversations over the rest of our heads might cause us average schmoes to miss something we want to learn. Ha ha. Thank you for considering there is a wide audience here all learning together, and taking the time to explain things. I know it is more work on your part to clarify things, and that extra effort is appreciated.

 

I would have to say that the best water to drink would be river water in a remote area without any factories or frequent vehicles nearby. The good thing about river water is that it will never go stagnant because it keeps moving all the time which is also a plus against lake and pond water. Rain water can be bad due to acidic rain and simply pollution in the air in general.