What are they doing to the water in the UK

[ByBrightSloth]

I used to be able to drink the tap water. It now tastes more like chlorine and can’t be drank after more than an hour or so of sitting out as it tastes rancid. I can actually smell it. I moved and it tasted ok but a few months later they must have started adding more chlorine and chemicals. How is this OK?

Two questions - do you use a water filter? And could this possibly be localised to your house/street?

Anecdotally, I've never met a foreign born person who lives in the UK that drinks neat Uk tap water, so I always got the feeling that we are mugs for assuming our plain tap water is actually harmless.

I remember installing a pond in my garden and people saying I have to let it fill up with rainwater because frogs avoid tap water. If it's not good enough for frogs ..I ain't drinking it without a filter!

The tap water in our village is delicious, fresh and cold. The tap water at my friend's house down the road is so bad I take my own bottled water to drink and mix with my whisky.

I expect to be moving in the next couple of years, and a taste of the tap water will be part of any house viewing.

And edited to say my German DH is happy to drink the tap water in England. In Spain we drink bottled water.

@SeatonCarew I love that your anecdote about bringing bottled water with you concluded that it was to put in your whiskey 🤣

But then in Irish, whiskey is uisce beatha which means 'water of life'

I stopped drinking it a while ago

I've been drinking only filtered water for a while now, I have a proper gravity filter not a brita type. I can really smell the chlorine in tap water now, it's so strong.

Our tap water tastes fine if you drink it straight away, but if you leave it to stand it tastes foul. We live in a hard water area though so I just assumed it was that.

Can everyone say approximately where they are? I'm in Derbyshire and I've always drunk tap water from various friends houses in different parts of the county. It's not changed recently. Bedford way used to taste very different but not a chlorinated taste.

I have always said there are at least two sorts of thirst in this life. 😊🥃🧊

I always fill a glass jug with water, running the tap vigorously, so that it bubbles up. I leave it for a couple of hours and it's drinkable.

I couldn't drink it from the tap as a kid in the 70s. It stank of chlorine and had a yellow tinge. My mother used to boil it and leave it overnight. It's why I took to drinking tea at the age of six.

I'm from the west Midlands and where I am the water is foul. It literally leaves a greasy film in your mouth 🤢

Chlorine does evaporate out if you leave the water to stand (in the fridge if you like) in an open jug, or if you boil it.

I've been boiling mine since the recent cryptospore(?) scare, but I'm not very scared - I still brush my teeth with tap water.

You should be able to tell what time of day your local water is heavily chlorinated - in most places, it's in the evening. It shouldn't be so noticeable at other times of day.

Tap water does taste different in different regions, because of where it comes from. I like London water but not Welsh, which is what I get now.

Anecdotally, I've never met a foreign born person who lives in the UK that drinks neat Uk tap water, so I always got the feeling that we are mugs for assuming our plain tap water is actually harmless.

FWIW, Scottish tap water is fine - I drink it like I would drink well water from a trusted source, or thoroughly filtered water, at home. Elsewhere in the UK though, I treat it as suspect. That doesn't mean it's bad everywhere, though, just that I don't know if it's good until I specifically check.

I liked the water when I lived in Aberdeen, it was very soft and pleasant to drink.

Yeah, I raise an eyebrow at these things that say "Don't waste money on bottled water or water filters, just let the water breathe for a few hours in the fridge before you drink it". It seems to work in some areas, but my tapwater (southeast England) is like yours — disgusting if left to stand for any time, whether in the fridge or at room temp. I buy a small amount of bottled water just to keep in the bedroom for morning medications or the odd nighttime sip, because there's no taps upstairs and I don't want to drink water that's been standing on the bedside table for more than an hour or two. Blergh.

Tap water is safe to drink across the UK. I feel very lucky to have that (and we should also appreciate it while it lasts - there may well be water supply issues in the future).

I don't care about slight differences in taste from one region to another. I'm just glad we have it!

The tap water in my area ~ north Cambridgeshire ~ has started smelling strongly of chlorine in the last few days.

I suspect that after the issues with Thames and South West water they have added more chlorine to be safe.

"Anecdotally, I've never met a foreign born person who lives in the UK that drinks neat Uk tap water, so I always got the feeling that we are mugs for assuming our plain tap water is actually harmless."

I think it's more likely that they grew up in places where either tap water wasn't good to drink. Or with a culture of drinking bottled water. Or they are living in a hard water area having grown up with soft water, and just don't like the taste.

This. It does taste different in different places, but that doesn't make it unsafe. And that's not a new thing either. I remember being on a school trip in that Yorkshire moors in the 80s and the water tasted rank, but it was fine.
My DH is an engineer whose specialism is water management. We were talking about this the other day because of the recent news items about drinking water issues. He said that the standard of drinking water quality in this country is really high, obviously notwithstanding the very unusual and rare problems that have occurred recently.

You really haven’t met many foreign born people, have you?

Yeah, the comment about 'foreign born people' is a bit weird tbh.

There are many countries where water safety IS an issue, so if people were brought up to be cautious of tap water then of course they are more likely to drink bottled water by habit.

But I also know loads of people who previously lived overseas with or without safe water who are perfectly happy to drink UK tap water.

I drink tap water at home and at work in south Devon. Not Brixham area though.

I know what you mean about the strong chlorine smell and taste. Our tap water used to be lovely. I find it’s ok though if left to stand for several hours. But straight out of the tap it’s vile. We are in the south east .

No, that wouldn’t happen

This is exactly true. Water companies test the water in each area and from each water treatment works, daily. 365 days a year

We live on the edge of the Pennines. Our tap water is delicious. There is a bottling plant locally, which bottles water and sells it as "Shepley Spring". A lot of the supermarket value brand bottled water comes from here too - look for "bottled at source in HD8 near Huddersfield".