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?

As someone who circulates between Leicestershire, London, Dorset, Glasgow, and Manchester, the tap water is absolutely fine everywhere and I can't tell the difference between any of them.

What can we do to stop them from putting all these extra chemicals in the water?

It's undrinkable, if even a drop of unfiltered water gets into a cup of tea (even after boiled) it completely ruins it. God knows what they are putting in it but I've been to many countries where it tastes beautiful so we're certainly fucking it it up somewhere along the line

@IbizaToTheNorfolkBroads we’re a stone’s throw away from you. Can confirm the water is lovely!

Southampton water however is disgusting. It’s cloudy with a horrible taste.

Genuinely don’t think I’ve drank tap water in about 10 years! Bottled or filtered only for us. Even the thought of drinking it nowadays makes me feel a bit sick to be honest - the scent of chlorine puts me right off

Not pleasant and not drinkable are also not the same thing.

They have perfectly safe tap water that they can drink and will not cause them harm. Most people in the UK have this, most of the time (and on occasions when they don't, there are water companies working to solve the issue).

The fact that they choose not to drink it is up to them and it's a first world privilege to have it in the first place.

Most countries in the world do not have safe tap water and water scarcity is going to become a big issue in the UK in the future too, so enjoy it whilst you have it.

My Cambridgeshire tap water tastes fine to me. I refuse to buy bottled water unless totally desperate on a day out. Images of plastic waste bobbing in the sea or at the bottom of the ocean haunt me.

You’re very easily haunted

My kids always complain about the Uk water and have to drink cordial when we visit. But we do live in Switzerland, where the water is excellent and readily available, and we drink so much (and I don't give them anything in their water).

I have to admit, I don't drink as much water when we are in the UK and I can see my kids point.

London water is fine.

We're in Hampshire and ours is lovely as drinking water, but it doesn't make great tea as it's hard. We visit Scotland frequently and the water where we stay is soft, it makes better tea but I don't like it plain at all, it doesn't quench my thirst and doesn't taste of anything.

I used to think the tap water where I live is disgusting - I moved here about 18 years ago. I reckon it took about 8 or 9 years to acclimate. It still can't cope with being left to stand though, I dunno what goes on but it tastes horrid. I think it's a reaction with the air as if stored in a sealed bottle in the fridge it's fine.

If, as some people have said, your tap water has some colouration or produces a film on a cup of tea, it's nothing to do with the 'chemicals' they put in (shocker, H2O is a chemical) but is something that comes from the water source. Film on a cup of tea will be because the water is hard. It could be processed a lot more to strip out the minerals and make it soft but that would be unnecessarily expensive, hard water is perfectly safe and many bottled mineral waters are hard. Interestingly, I did a commercial brewery tour years ago, they made a variety of big brand beers and they would take the local (hard) water, completely strip out all the minerals with a special filter then would add in the minerals that exist naturally in the area the beer they were making came from so it tasted authentic.

Of course, some people's tap water may taste faintly of bison shit.

@MrsMoastyToasty what causes the tcp taste? We get that sometimes but normally our water is lovely.

Lots of the taste differences are to do with the water source. In the west it tends to be reservoirs and so its much nicer at hasn't absorbed loads of minerals. In the south east it's coming from underground so it can be really chalky, that's what causes all the limescale and the grittyness and film on your tea.

That probably needs more chemicals added rather than less.

@WonderingWanda The TCP taste happens when the chlorine (the only thing added to mains water) reacts with the phenols in non drinking water compatible washers and forms tri-chloro phenols (aka TCP).

https://www.wessexwater.co.uk/your-water/taste-and-odour#:~:text=TCP%20or%20medicinal,-Medicinal%20or%20TCP&text=Although%20these%20are%20not%20considered,on%20washing%20machines%20or%20dishwashers

I got a visit the other day by a water tester. She knocked on the door. Great job actually. She spends her days in random areas testing people's tap water. She took about half a hour, running different samples. Not linked to issues, they just regularly test samples. She loved her job!

Our west midlands water is lovely but the water that comes out of my parents house an hour south tastes like bleach and makes my eyes sting if I have a shower there. They say they can’t taste it so I guess you get used to what you’re drinking every day.

Scottish tap water in my part of Scotland at least is absolutely brilliant. No limescale, no weird taste. People who live here and buy bottled water need their head read.

I work in flood risk management.. we regularly (every year or 2) have to £50k+ removing plastic waste - mostly bottles - that accumulate in a particular corner of a particular river, to the extent that the "bottle berg" is causing a flood risk.

I also don't buy drinking single use plastic bottles.

Also you get plastic leaking in to the water from bottles.

I've been keeping fish for a couple of years so actually test my water (Cumbria, Lake District) and used to get reading of around 30 TDS (everything in the water) 0/1 GH (general hardness) and 0/1 KH (carbonate hardness)

Noticed a few weeks ago my tank readings were off so tested the tap water again and now I'm getting readings of
208TDS
11/12 GH
7 KH
Been like that for a few weeks now and got a similar story from another fish keeper that lives in the North East

So something is being done differently

Thames Water here too.

I use a Brita filter for drinking and making tea and coffee. It definitely tastes better through the filter though I'm not sure how much it really removes the chlorine and impurities.

Is Brita still considered to be an OK filter or are there better ones?

I bought a distiller. It is one of my favourite possessions. OMG the difference!

You should see the shite left behind after just one run of 4 litres of tap water and the smell off it. Bleurghh!