Stapleton said she now relies more on filtered water at her home in New Jersey.

But study co-author Beizhan Yan, a Columbia environmental chemist who increased his tap water usage, pointed out that filters themselves can be a problem by introducing plastics.

“There’s just no win,” Stapleton said.

Oh, man.

[–] porkins@sh.itjust.works 1 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Distill water, then add minerals back into it, and bottle in glass, profit.

[–] Showroom7561@lemmy.ca 2 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Probably the best way. Distillation uses a lot of electricity, doesn't it?

[–] porkins@sh.itjust.works 1 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Not necessarily. It just requires excitation at a molecular level. You can get creative with your source. They have been playing around with low energy methods like LED or even just using the sun, geothermal, etc.

[–] TonyTonyChopper@mander.xyz 1 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Resistive heating is 100% efficient at turning electrical energy into heat

[–] n3m37h@sh.itjust.works 0 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Unless it gets coated in salt...

[–] TonyTonyChopper@mander.xyz 0 points 10 months ago (1 children)

wrong

[–] n3m37h@sh.itjust.works 1 points 10 months ago

Rock salt will act as a thermal barrier, sure you may be able to turn the electricity into heat but transfering that heat is another story

What happens when you distill salt water? It leaves behind rock salts...

[–] Showroom7561@lemmy.ca 1 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Yes, I'm aware of different way to distill, but if this were to work in a home/commercial setting, it needs to be accessible/affordable.

I'd personally love to get a home distiller, but I read they were very expensive to run :(

[–] porkins@sh.itjust.works 1 points 10 months ago (1 children)

I was about to write back that we are not far off the advances to make these affordable and then did a google search and found that you can get a distilled unit on Amazon for $180 that is capable of making a gallon in 5 hours for about $.45 worth of electricity. That is far less than what it costs to buy distilled water at the store, which is around $1 a gallon. If you look at this from a break-even analysis, you technically start to reap the rewards of ownership after about 800 uses since the first 400 uses basically cost you $1.45 per gallon, then the next 400 costs you $.45 per gallon, but you are recouping that extra cost over the $1 retail price, so by the 800th use, you are getting water at less than half the price of the store.

[–] Showroom7561@lemmy.ca 1 points 10 months ago (1 children)

A gallon is not much though, not for a family. If you have to double or triple that amount, the electricity costs will really add up. If you're talking European electricity costs, you might as well drink expensive wine instead 😂

If cost was more in line with traditional filters, then it may be a more accessible option. But electricity costs are only going up.

[–] porkins@sh.itjust.works 1 points 10 months ago

Even with fission, nuclear is a panacea of energy with almost no waste for modern reactors. I can see there being an initial rise in energy costs to get those projects built out though. If they are phasing out nuclear, that would be dumb.

Additionally, researchers at MIT recently found that you can evaporate water without heat, so that should hopefully be a thing in the near future.

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