Bottled Alkaline Water versus Alkalised Water
There is a new trend to buy bottled alkaline water instead of normal bottled mineral water. But the question is whether this is actually any better for you.
The water itself in these ‘alkaline water bottles’ which you can purchase from many health food stores around the world is, in fact, alkaline. But the process in which it is made alkaline is the important factor.
Bottled alkaline water is created by adding chemicals to the water to raise the pH of the water so the water can be marketed and sold as alkaline water. However the chemicals used to make the water alkaline are what gives alkaline water all the negative feedback which is entirely justified.
For example, the chemicals in Kroger’s Alkaline Water are Potassium Hydroxide, Calcium Chloride, and Magnesium Chloride. Let’s look at these briefly and in turn:
Potassium Hydroxide is inorganic and commonly referred to as caustic potash. Potassium Hydroxide is used in the cosmetic and skin care industry as a pH adjuster or bufferer in a wide range of formulas, including bath products, cleansing products, fragrances, foot powders, hair dyes and colors, makeup, nail products, shampoos, shaving products, and various skin care products. Potassium Hydroxide is extremely corrosive and can be a hazardous irritant when exposure is at high levels (or builds up in your system over time).
Calcium Chloride is an inorganic compound, a salt that is highly soluble in water. It is mainly used for de-icing and dust control. It is also used as a desiccant (drying out).
Magnesium Chloride is a salt extracted from magnesium. It is used similarly as Calcium Chloride in industry.
Together these added compounds added to your water can adversely affect your blood pH – and that is why you do not want to over consume these compounds – which is exactly what you would do if your goal was to get hydrated with bottled alkaline water.
The deception that the bottled water manufacturers are using here is actually based on real research and real health benefits. However, the bottled alkaline water is alkaline in name only. It is essentially chemically alkaline without any of the real health benefits.
The real water you should be drinking is alkalized water that is created through the process of ionization by Kangen Water machines. These machines convert your tap water into alkalised water and alkalised water is what will give you all the health benefits. The machine feeds your tap water into the electrolysis chamber and the H+ and the OH- are separated and expelled each through its own hose. The OH- water is highly pH through an electrical restructuring of the molecules NOT through chemical additives that are not good for you.
Kangen Water is Electrolysed Restructured Water – it uses electricity (not chemical additives) to create a high pH water that is actually restructured from a 5-sided positive, low energy water that is not very absorbable to a perfectly crystalized hexagonal structure that contains a negative charge and is an extremely powerful antioxidant. There is a lot of research on electrolysed water – and if you want to see the scientific research you should take a look on Google Scholar or PubMed.
Kangen Water® is the trademark water that comes from a Japanese company called Enagic. Enagic has been creating medical grade water ionizers since 1974 and hospitals throughout Japan use these machines as standard practice. They are widely understood and known to be the gold standard in the water industry and the only company you should consider when choosing an ionizer for your home or business.
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Is bottled water bad for you?
Would you knowingly drink a bottle of chemicals or eat a piece of plastic? In effect you are doing just so when you choose to drink bottled water.
Facts on why it is bad for our health
A recent German-led study found that a single bottle of bottle water contained nearly 25,000 chemicals!
Plastic Water bottles are often stored in the desert in the hot sun or out in the open on container ships traveling across the world where the plastic gets soft and the chemicals leach into the water.
Plastic bottles contain chemicals which are known endocrine disruptors that affect hormones of humans and wildlife.
Facts on why it is bad for the environment
Bottling water is bad for the environment as it produces more than 2.5 million tons of carbon dioxide.
Did you know that it takes 3 litres of water to produce 1 litre of bottled water.
More than five trillion pieces of plastic are already in the oceans, and by 2050 there will be more plastic in the sea than fish, by weight, according to the Ellen MacArthur Foundation.
Did you know that Americans are said to use 2.5 million plastic bottles every hour. Every year, 8 million metric tons of plastic end up in our oceans. which is equivalent to five grocery bags filled with plastic for every foot of coastline in the world.
The process of producing bottled water requires around 6 times as much water per bottle as there is in the container.
14% of all litter comes from beverage containers. When caps and labels are considered, the number is higher.
Approximately 1 million sea birds die from plastic each year.
At least two thirds of the world’s fish stocks are suffering from plastic ingestion.
Australia ’s annual use of bottled water generates more than 60,000 tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions – the same amount that 13,000 cars generate over the course of a year.
More than 145.7 million litres of oil was used in the production, transportation, refrigeration and recycling/disposing of bottled water in Australia in 2009-10
Assuming the 582.9 million litres of bottled water produced in 2009-10 is in litre bottles, according to these figures, 373 million of those bottles will end up as waste.
To be honest this is just a selection of stats that I have come across. There is clearly no doubt in my mind that bottled water is bad for me and bad for the earth! Below you will find some videos discussing some of the reasons why bottled water is not the healthy or eco choice.