All being on this Earth of ours run on water, and we humans are no exception.
This is why it doesn’t mean much if you were to follow the best possible diet and make sure you avoid alcohol and cigarettes if you drink polluted water regularly.
Of course, we’re not saying that eating healthy and avoiding the aforementioned vices is useless, but the positive effects you’d get from following such a lifestyle can be negated by ingesting dirty water.
The thing is, the water that comes from the city water supply may look clean at the first glance, but it comes with a wide variety of pollutants that can make your life miserable if you don’t take steps to filtrate the water you’re drinking.
On the other hand, other than buying a filtration system, simply changing the pipes and improving the quality of the plumbing fixtures in your home can do wonders for improving the quality of your tap water.
As a large chunk of the pollution and the impurities that you end up ingesting comes from the old pipes with plenty of sedimentation and dirty stuff on them.
In this article, we’re going to talk about plumbing and the great many pipes that it encompasses and how something as simple as changing the sort of pipes you’re using for your bathroom can have a positive effect on the quality of water you’re drinking. Here’s the deal.
Table of Contents
Commonly-Used Materials for the Plumbing Pipes
Pipes and Joints Containing Lead
While you probably won’t find any pipes that are 100% made out of lead, most of old houses (especially those made before the 1930’s) have pipes, plumbing joints, and various fixtures that contain a certain percentage of the lead.
Interestingly, even the pipes and other plumbing parts that were advertised as lead-free also contained a certain amount of lead, the only difference between them and the older pipes is the percentage of the metal in them, which was somewhat lower in the so-called ‘lead-free’ alternatives.
As you probably know already, lead is a fairly poisonous material and exposure to it can lead to several health hazards including general weakness, anemia, as well as kidney and brain damage. It is especially dangerous for pregnant women and children.
PVC Pipes
Although PVC has not been having as bad of a reputation as pipes containing lead, some versions of the pipes made from this material, especially those made before 1977, have been said to contain some potentially carcinogenic elements, which can leach off of the inner walls of the pipe and into your water.
The harmful chemicals in question are mostly there because the manufacturing process for the PVC itself requires it, but this doesn’t change the fact that some of these elements can still stay with the pipes and slowly but surely enter your water supply.
Alternative Plumbing Pipe Materials
Copper Pipes
Representing possibly one of the best overall solutions for pipes, copper is a material you can rest assured won’t bring your water supply into jeopardy, thanks to the fact that it doesn’t leach into your water supply over time.
As long as you carefully set up the pipes and joints, you can rest assured that copper plumbing pipes will last you for decades.
This is why you may want to get a team of folks providing professional plumbing services involved, too, by the way.
It’s better to be sure that your plumbing will be done well, than trying to do it yourself if you aren’t experienced in the trade.
Also, copper pipes are sufficiently tough to survive for years to come, as long as the quality of water is not subpar, so that sedimentation becomes a problem.
Acidity, too, can cause problems for copper pipes, as these water that has pH levels below 7 will start corroding the copper.
Polypropylene Pipes
If copper pipes can be considered an alternative to old metal pipes that contain lead, then polypropylene pipes would be an excellent alternative to PVC pipes.
Polypropylene represents a type of plastic that doesn’t leach nearly as much as PVC tends to, so you won’t have to worry about getting some terrible disease on account of a bunch of rogue chemicals infesting your water supply.
Also, polypropylene is a breeze to connect and set up because it can be merged with other polypropylene parts by simply heating them. This means you won’t have to buy any special joints or glues ‘n’ solvents to make these two parts stick together well.
Water Filtration
Carbon Filters
One of the most common forms that carbon filters come in would be water pitchers.
The pitcher itself is typically made out of plastic and then there’s a large filter in the middle of it based on carbon.
When you pour the water in the pitcher, the carbon filter will slowly do its magic and get the water inside rid of a large chunk of potentially hazardous chemicals and sedimentation.
This means that when you pour the water out of the pitcher and into a glass, the water inside will be safe to drink.
Of course, no filtration contraption can claim to remove all sediments and ‘foreign’ elements from the water, but then again, that isn’t the goal, either.
Reverse Osmosis Filters
There’s another breed of filters you may want to take into consideration if you want to ensure you can always have access to clean and potable water.
With reverse osmosis filters, carbon filters are just a part of a complex set of filters that remove a wide variety of different pollutants from the water.
These water-filtration systems can tackle larger quantities of water than simple pitchers and would probably be a better overall solution than the aforementioned pitcher models.
All in all, improving the quality of your domestic life inevitably revolves around enhancing the quality of the water you’re drinking, use for cooking, and showering with.
Luckily for anyone interested in doing this, the procedure is as simple as changing the pipes and adding some filtration contraption to your roster of kitchen appliances.
