stories : Nagging Question
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Time in a BottleDoes water in plastic containers go bad? |
Does bottled water ever go bad?
Like all packaged food and drink, bottled water is regulated by the FDA, whose position is that there’s no limit on its shelf life (provided it was bottled and stored properly).
So why does bottled water have an expiration date? Blame New Jersey. A 1987 law in that state required all foods (legally, water is a food) sold in New Jersey to display an expiration date of two years or less from their date of manufacture. Because it would be inefficient to make separately labeled batches of product just for New Jersey, most bottled water producers began stamping their products with a two-year expiration date, says Stephen Kay, vice president of communications for the International Bottled Water Association. A bill repealing the requirement was signed into law in early 2006, but many large retailers like Wal-Mart now insist on expiration dates.
That doesn’t mean, however, that the bottles you’ve been storing in your basement for the Apocalypse will taste the same as those you bought last week. The plastic (high-density polyethylene, or HDPE) that makes up most bottles is slightly porous, which means the water inside can pick up smells and tastes from its environment. “The bottles are … not hermetically sealed,” Kay says. A few months or years in a musty basement will result in musty-tasting, but not unsafe, water. “I’m not aware of any issue that would make them nonconsumable,” says Dr. Sam Beattie, a food safety extension specialist at Iowa State University. But just to be cautious, you probably shouldn’t store your bottled water (or, for that matter, anything you intend to consume) near gasoline, paint, or other noxious chemicals.
As your bottles sit, there may be some migration of chemicals from the plastic into the water, but FDA spokesman Mike Herndon says the levels are “well within the margin of safety.” You may have heard about health problems caused by plastic leaching into water from bottles. However, that applies to containers that have a high percentage of polycarbonate (like many of the hard bottles people buy at camping stores to use over and over), not HDPE or PET (polyethylene terephthalate, another popular water bottle plastic).
So there's nuthing wrong w/ a bottle of water that's been in the fridge for since i donno? I've always been somewhat doubtful and thrown them out!
This post does not exactly address the issue but recently in New Zealand one of the 60-minutes type news shows here recently documented the danger of clear plastic water bottles in cup holders in a car sitting in the sun. Evidently the plastic water bottle acts like a magnifying glass and burned a hole in the back seat! They actually took a car and showed how it works and voila, the back seat started smoldering and they showed the small burned hole in the seat!
We recently had this discussion in our office. We were out of bottled water and were scavaging around the office fridge for some sort of liquid to quench our thirsts. There was a tupperware type container filled with water on the door of the fridge and right before we were going to pour out a few glasses I noticed black mold like spores all over the container. Could that be because of whatever was previously in the container or did the water really mold? I can't say how long the water had been in the fridge but our break room and small kitchen appliances are not exactly the epitome of cleanliness. Yuck...
You also shouldn't drink water from plastic bottles you've left sitting in the car because of bacteria. It's okay if the weather stays below about 50 degrees, but once the weather warms up, the water can go bad.
Yeah, this only applies to UNOPENED bottles. Once you open them up all kinds of bacteria can get inside!
If water stays too long in a plastic bottle (1 year or more) it starts to taste more like plastic. And if water stays in a metallic container, even one day is enough to make it have a metallic taste to it.
Drinking water out of plastic bottles, no matter how old, is a bad idea on many levels. Do some Googling for details. Bacteria, chemical leaching, and not least of all the massive plastic waste we're left with (they're rarely recycled). And if you're getting a 'chemical' or 'plastic' taste in your water, well, I sure wouldn't want to drink it.
Here's an update on the subject. August report says there's negligible risk for adults.
http://cerhr.niehs.nih.gov/chemicals/...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lexan
More specifically an update regarding Bisphenol A and Nalgene bottles.
Speaking of bottled water, did you heard about this amazing charity program set up by Volvic and the UNICEF.
Just check this out:
http://www.drink1give10.com
It is not directly related, but it deserves taking a look at it...
Tell me what you think about it!