Friday, April 12, 2013

LIES ABOUT - DISTILLED WATER

A few issues that need to be discussed, following a recent posting online of un-researched lies about distilled water.

MYTH:
DISTILLED WATER IS ACIDIC

Pure distilled water is neutral with a pH of 7.0.  Due to the lack of dissolved solids (salts, heavy metals, inorganic minerals) in distilled or reverse osmosis water, there is nothing to resist a change in pH, that is to say, pure water has no buffering capacity.  Therefore, the slight adsorption of carbon dioxide from the air will create a slightly lower pH reading for pure water, but the pH is virtually meaningless since the addition of the smallest amount of either acid or base will easily change its pH.  When you consider that pH of your stomach acid is 100,000 times more acidic, you can understand why the pH of pure water is completely irrelevant.

Nationally known nutritionist, Dr. Andrew Weil, a Harvard Medical School graduate and founder of Integrative Medicine Program at the University of Arizona, has stated, “As far as acidity goes, distilled water is close to neutral pH and has NO effect on the body’s acid/alkaline balance.

The late Dr. Carey Reams, world renowned expert on body pH, was trained in mathematics, biophysics and biochemistry.  According to him, distilled water was the best to drink and is still used today by those who practice his system of pH balancing.

MYTH:
DISTILLERS CONCENTRATE VOLATILE ORGANIC COMPOUNDS (VOCS) AND DISINFECTION BYPRODUCTS (DBPS)

This statement shows a lack of basic understanding of the distillation process that is used in virtually all distillers for consumer use. Waterwise distillers use AIR cooled technology in which one gallon of distilled water is produced from one gallon of tap water.  If there were 1 part of VOC in the tap water, and 100% of that VOC carried over with the steam, you would still have only 1 part of VOC in the distilled water.  Waterwise distillers do NOT concentrate or increase any contaminant into the distilled water.  If your tap water contains VOCS and DBPS, they are easily removed from the distillate by using a coconut-shell carbon post filter, which is included with Waterwise distillation systems.

In distillers that use WATER cooled technology (mainly laboratory type units), it may be possible to increase concentration of VOCS since several gallons of tap water pass through the distiller to create one gallon.  This issue is also easily resolved by pre-heating the tap water to release the VOCS prior to entering the boiler, carbon filtration as pre-treatment and/or post treatment.  Again, Waterwise distillers do NOT use this type of cooling and do NOT concentrate or increase any contaminants.


MYTH:
DISTILLATION IS INEFFECTIVE AT REMOVING TOXIC FLUORIDE, DISTILLATION CAN REMOVE AN ESTIMATE 55-60% OF FLUORIDE, BUT THE REST WILL GET TRANSFERRED.

While we agree that fluoride should not be forced upon consumers through drinking water, these statements completely disregard the basic physics of distillation.  Distillation removes the water from the contaminants, unlike filtration and reverse osmosis that reduce the contaminants from the water.  Contaminants that have a heavier molecular weight than water (16 gram/mol) or with a boiling temperature higher than water (100 degrees C) cannot carry with the steam and are therefore left in the boiler.  If you are a distiller user, you have positive proof of this by the gunk left in the boiler.

Sodium Fluoride is molecularly heavier than water (41 g/mol versus 16 g/mol) and boils at a much higher temperature (1695 degrees C versus 100 degrees C). 

In example of distillation’s effectiveness for fluoride removal:
Waterwise Model 8800 was tested to NSF/ANSI Standard 62 for fluoride reduction.  The challenge water contained 8.6 mg/L of fluoride. After distilling, the product water contained less than 0.10 mg/L.  This is a reduction rate of greater than 98.8%!  It was probably closer to 100% but the laboratory doesn’t have equipment that can accurately measure below 0.10 mg/L.


The US EPA and the Water Quality Association recommend distillation for fluoride removal:



MYTH:
DISTILLED WATER LEACHES MINERALS FROM YOUR BODY WHICH CAN LEAD TO HEALTH PROBLEMS

This is oldest argument by those that sell carbon filters.  They want you to believe that the carbon filter will remove only harmful substances and leave in the healthy ones.  What they don’t tell you is that inorganic contaminants in water are not removed by carbon filtration.  While calcium and magnesium are inorganic, so are arsenic, chromium, nitrates, and heavy metals.  Is it really worth the possible benefit to receive minuscule amounts of salt-based minerals from water but also risk consuming substances that are detrimental to health?

Dr. Ron Kennedy, anti-aging specialist and founder of the popular website, medical-library.net, argues that carbon based minerals from living systems are the most bioavailable (i.e. from fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, etc.).  The calcium you find in water is calcium carbonate.  “Carbonate is not a sufficiently complex organic molecule and therefore cannot properly contribute its calcium to living systems.  The calcium comes out instead in ionic form and precipitates by forming other salts.  Common locations for precipitation of calcium are the lens of the eyes (cataracts), the kidneys (kidney stones) and the walls of arteries (arteriosclerosis).”

There are many proponents of distilled water who agree it is not detrimental to health or longevity, but just the opposite.  Some include Dr. Norman Walker, Ph.D., avidly supported drinking only distilled.  He died at the ‘early’ age of 99.  Dr. Paul Bragg, “Father of America’s Health Movement”, died by accident at the tender age of 81.  And there are many others, including tens of thousands of Waterwise customers.



We have researched water purification for over 35 years.  There have been and continue to be those that perpetuate scams, myths and hoaxes for the benefit of one thing… their wallet.  We would be happy to mail you a complimentary copy of a special report “Drinking Water Scams Exposed” ($15 value) that goes into much more detail about Mercola’s opinion and other outright lies.  Please reply with your postal mailing address for your free copy.www.waterwise.com