What impurities can come out of the tap?

  • Lead and copper from the domestic pipework can cause illnesses

  • Asbestos fibres from old drinking water mains are classified as carcinogenic

  • Pesticides and phosphates enter the groundwater from agriculture and waste water

  • The active ingredients of many billions of pharmaceutical preparations from discarded packages are increasingly representing a serious problem (blood lipid reducers, analgesics, betablockers, hormones, female sex hormones from the contraceptive pill, etc.)

  • Bacteria and viruses are certainly destroyed by chlorination or UV radiation, yet they remain in drinking water. Only by distillation or reverse osmosis can we avoid drinking them as well

  • Tensides enter the water from colorants and detergents

  • In addition to chlorine, trihalomethanes also often enter the drinking water. They can occur as reaction products of chlorination

Germany has strict drinking water regulations aimed at ensuring high-grade and safe water quality. These are stricter than the regulations for mineral and table water. The waterworks cannot examine our groundwater for everything however for purely economic reasons, neither can they filter out every impurity. Consequently it can happen that a wide range of harmful substances find their way into drinking water. The most important are listed here.

The reasonable threshold limit values for drinking water are based, for example, on the average tolerance of a healthy adult. For adolescents who are still growing, the elderly, the sick, allergy sufferers, children, babies and foetuses the threshold limit values are not without hazard. Environmental groups and environmental medical practitioners have been stressing this for years.

Harmful substances in the body – an example

If just one single gram of the many harmful substances which we absorb each day is deposited in our body each day, this is already more than 350 grams after one year – more than 3.5 kilograms in 10 years – over 7 kilograms in 20 years – and over the course of a lifetime?