I just found this on another site and wanted to share.  I rarely purchase bottled water anymore, and by rarely I’d say it would be a stretch to say I purchase it as frequently as one bottle a month.  I have to be rather desperate as I always pack my own stainless steel bottles when traveling.

posted by Mel, selected from Food & Water Watch Aug 10, 2009 3:08 pm

Tap water is regulated by the EPA as well as state and local governments, but bottled water is only checked by the Food and Drug Administration. The FDA doesn’t even get to most food plants every year, with some plants going five or ten years between inspections. Though the FDA is supposed to test bottled water at the same standards as the EPA, FDA guidelines are years behind the EPA’s. Here are some of the more disturbing examples:

• Municipal water is not permitted to contain E. coli or fecal coliform bacteria. FDA rules for bottled water include no such prohibitions.

• Municipal water from surface sources must be filtered and disinfected, or it must have strict pollution controls. There are no filtration or disinfection requirements for bottled water at the federal level. The only source-water protection, filtration or disinfection provisions for bottled water are delegated to the states, and many states have adopted no meaningful programs.

• Cities must have their water tested by government-certified labs. No certification requirement exists for bottlers.

• Municipal tap water must be tested for coliform bacteria 100 or more times a month. New York City takes 500,000 samples of its water per year. That’s nearly once a minute all year long. Bottled water plants only have to test once a week.

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