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Plastic Fibers Found In 83 Percent of World's Tap Water, Study Reveals (theguardian.com)
Robotron23 writes: Research published by Orb Media, a nonprofit journalism group, has revealed that microplastics have contaminated high proportions of drinking water and bottled water. Samples from the United States tested positive in 94% of instances, while Europe's contamination averages around 72%. Tests were undertaken at the University of Minnesota School of Public Health, with lead researcher Dr. Anne Marie Mahon noting the risk of plastics carrying bacteria, and commenting: "In terms of fibers, the diameter is 10 microns across and it would be very unusual to find that level of filtration in our drinking water systems." As for the culprit, the report mentions the atmosphere as one obvious source, "with fibers shed by the everyday wear and tear of clothes and carpets." Another potential source is tumble dryers, "with almost 80% of U.S. households having dryers that usually vent to the open air." Overall, the investigation by Orb Media found that 83% of the samples were contaminated with plastic fibers.
Just wait until a fracker starts injecting waste water into the water table near you .....
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
Plastic of all shapes and sizes is literally everywhere people go. Take a walk around your neighborhood sometime and just start picking up any random garbage you see. You'll be surprised just how much you pick up in just a few hundred square feet. Plastic pieces of all colors, shapes, and sizes. Bags. Lids. Shards. Parts of toys. Unidentified stuff...
The stranger part to me is that so many educated people don't care at all about the issue, even though it is just as important as climate change and other forms of toxic pollution due to the enormous amounts of it we're putting into the environment every day. Even here, there will be many comments along the lines of, "Yeah, yeah, plastic in the water is bad - but I'm more worried about X in the water."
Means nothing without mentioning concentrations. By the same logic 99% of water is also contaminated with uranium and cyanide.
In fact most premium bottled waters are filtered by reverse osmosis, which would actually deal with the particles the article discusses.
That is complete crap. Most bottled water comes straight from tap with a small minority actually going through additional filtration. RO is a comparatively slow and expensive process and does not scale well enough for mass purposes. I ought to know, I use RO to produce water for my multi-thousand litre marine fish tanks.