What Distilling Water Can Do For Your Health

We'd like to think the water coming out of the tap must be pure, but unfortunately science as well as our own observations will reveal this to not be the case.

If you're on a healthy raw food diet you're avoiding many of the poisons most people put in their bodies. It's rather infuriating, then, to be forced to drink many more of them.

Luckily, by distilling water we can easily free ourselves from contamination.

Distilling Water: Background

We haven't been taking care of our limited fresh water, a precious resource.

That would be enough if we took care of it, but unfortunately, we're trashing our water.

A 2000 survey by the US EPA found 40% of rivers and 45% of lakes in the United States are considered too polluted for fishing, swimming, or aquatic life (2), much less drinking. Most of the rest of the world is in a similar position.

Distilling Water: Our Clean Water Isn't Clean.

We know our water is polluted, so we go through the rather laborious process of cleaning it up as best we can to produce tap water....and then proceed to trash it again.

In the name of public health and safety, we add chemicals we know can harm us to our drinking water, including chlorine and fluoride.

Chlorine, which in gas form was a chemical weapon used to fry the lungs of soldiers during World War I, can kill a person in high doses (3). Fluoride, ostensibly put into the water to help our teeth, can also kill us (4), and is is associated with all manner of other problems, including the degradation of the skeletal system and discoloration of the teeth (5), (6).

Fluoride is also known to decrease IQ and motor functions in developing children (7).

In the name of the public good we're poisoning ourselves.

Distilling Water: The Chemicals We're Not Trying To Add

The eleven most prevalent are:

• Atenolol, A beta-blocker used for cardiovascular disease.
• Atrazine, A herbicide banned in the European Union, but still used in the US, which has been implicated in the decline of fish stocks and in changes in animal behaviour.
• Carbamazepine: A mood-stabilizer used for bipolar disorder.
• Estrone: An oestrogen hormone secreted by the ovaries and blamed for causing gender-bending changes in fish.
• Gemfibrozil: A Cholesterol lowering drug.
• Meprobamate, A tranquiliser used for psychiatric treatment.
• Naproxen: A painkiller and anti-inflammatory drug linked to an increases in asthma incidence.
• Phenytoin: Anti-epilepsy drug.
• Sulfamethoxazole: An antibiotic.
• TCEP: A reducing agent used in molecular biology.
• Trimethoprim - An antibiotic.

How do you feel about having these in your drinking water?

Distilling Water: How A Water Distiller Can Help

Most water purifiers and filters won't remove all of these, but a distilling water can get you as close to pure as you'll find anywhere.

Distilling water is simply the process of boiling water and then condensing the steam in a new container, leaving almost all the containments behind.

This is not some crazy idea, but merely a replication of what mother nature has been doing for million of years - evaporation and condensation. We just use modern technology to speed the process. Scientists and chemists have long used distilled water in experiments because of its purity, and its used in automotive cooling systems because the minerals and ions found intap water can be corrosive to internal engine components.

It's surprisingly satisfying to pry the lid off your water distiller after making a gallon or two only to find a tiny puddle of brackish water at the bottom. The smell of chemicals is clear when you do so, and it makes me happy to know I've removed these things from my water.

What Impurities Will Distillation Remove?

Virtually everything. A distiller can remove about 99.5 percent of impurities from water. These include, but are not limited to:

• Nitrates, Such as Fertilizer
• Bacteria
• Cysts
• Viruses
• Sodium
• Dissolved Solids
• Most Organic Compounds, Including Solvents, Herbicides and Pesticides
• Heavy Metals Such As Lead and Arsenic
• Radionucleides

What Impurities Will Distillers Not Remove?

But Don't I Need Minerals The Found In Water?

No. We get our minerals from food - fruits and vegetables. The amount of minerals dissolved in water is so minuscule that depending on them to meet out needs is unrealistic.

What Water Distiller Should I Buy?

There are plenty of excellent models out there, with the more expensive ones generally distilling a greater amount of water at one time than the inexpensive ones.

What should you look for in a water distiller? You'll want a stainless steel boiling chamber, because plastic leaches into water, and either a stainless steel or glass storage container for the same reason. You'll also want a post-treatment carbon filter to remove VOCS.

The model I use and think is excellent is actually at the lower end of the price specturm. It also meets all of the above requirements. It's the Nutriteam Countertop Water Distiller

It produces delicious water, and seeing how much disgusting residue is left at the bottom of the boiling chamber will really make you happy you own a water distiller.

Read a full review here.

Distilling Water: Following Up

Distilling Water Sources