Do Brita Filters Do Anything

Yesterday, I was continuing in the communal bathroom, waiting for my Brita Bullpen to fill up. Since information technology takes a decent 5 minutes to filter all of the water through, information technology gave me time to retrieve. Was I wasting my precious time every bit a decorated higher student, or do Brita pitchers actually piece of work? And if so, how? I mean, sure, nosotros all know that the filters accept out some chemicals out of tap water, but in the terminate, is it really that different from regular tap water?

To answer my questions, I did some research…and this is what I found:

According to Brita'due south website, the filters supposedly remove xiii chemicals found in tap water.

What Brita claims to remove (this chart can be found on Brita's website)

What Brita claims to remove (this chart can be plant on Brita's website)

Brita'southward website also includes a list of negative furnishings that can issue in drinking unfiltered water. Some of the side effects include nausea and liver, pancreatic, and kidney impairment (A list of these can be found here )

How it works:

The filters work past extracting the harsh chemicals found in the water. Every bit the molecules pass through the filter, they cling to the surface area due to the help of the carbon that is plant inside the filters. This is too why we are told to change the filter ever two months. Once the surface area of the inside of the filter is full, the process will not work anymore (Brita.com).

water

Other Viewpoints:

An article from The Daily Beast sates that general water filters do less than we think. In fact, according to this commodity, subsequently a sense of taste test, nigh people can't tell the difference between filtered water and tap h2o. In general, water filters are only qualified to extract a small per centum of chemicals. Mutual chemicals constitute in tap h2o, such equally pb or pesticide remains, are not typically removed from filters.

According to Raymond Letterman, a civil engineering professor at Syracuse University, some filters can even add extra bacteria into our water. He mentions that because of biofilm, which is some of the residue left from the filters, there is always a chance for a layer of bacteria to be on the surface of our filtered h2o (Schulson).

Furthermore, a written report conducted in Germany establish that filtered h2o more frequently than not has more bacteria than unfiltered tap water. This written report tested the Brita filter in a household setting and found that the per centum of bacteria increased in 24 out of 34 filters. Furthermore, in a lab setting, after one week of utilise at the same temperature, 4 out of half-dozen filters tested had more bacteria. Fifty-fifty more shockingly, groups of bacteria present in filtered water were 10,000 times college than regular tap water. In brusk, because of biofilm, filtered water produced more bacteria compared to unfiltered h2o.

water2

And then, since filters conspicuously don't remove all of the toxins found in our h2o, what other prophylactic solutions are there?

Although humid water has been around since, well, the beginning of fourth dimension, it doesn't necessarily impale all of the toxins constitute in water. According to this article, boiling water still may non remove 100% all of the chemicals plant in regular tap water.

In conclusion, practice water filters really piece of work? Is drinking tap water just equally safe equally filtered water? Well, afterward making correlations from observing the data we have collected thus far, it's safe to say that filters (usually) can take out some common molecules plant in your water pipes. However, studies withal found that sometimes filters can crusade more harm than skilful, by creating even more bacteria over fourth dimension. And, although boiling water may piece of work, there is never a 100% guarantee that all toxins will filter out of your water. Then, you will never truly take out all the chemicals found in tap water (unless, of course, yous purchase a yard dollar filtering system). And that'south okay, because ordinarily, the water that comes out of our kitchen sinks isn't too harmful anyway. Most people simply opt to use filters for personal sense of taste.

Image 2

Image 3