At-home water testing kits check for contaminants
With news events like the lead-contaminated drinking water in Flint, Michigan, natural disasters such as hurricanes temporarily harming water supplies and general reports of water-quality issues, consumers may be more interested in testing the water in their homes.
A recent survey by water-filtration company Bluewater showed 56 percent of Americans worry their drinking water contains toxins, with one-third concerned about lead and toxic metals.
Marc Edwards, professor of civil engineering at Virginia Tech and one of the scientists who uncovered the lead-poisoned water in Flint, said consumers’ concerns are legitimate.
“Even if 95 percent of the waters outtherearesafetodrinkandare meeting federal law, the fact that 5, 10 percent are not is enough to justify fear,” Edwards said.
Tom Round, vice president of business development at Silver Lake Research Corp., which produces the Watersafe Test Kits (starting at $19.95 through www.watersafetestkits.com) and private-labels water-testing kits, said his company had seen steady interest for the kits, but demand has increased recently.
“We really got to the inflection point after the Flint crisis,” Round said.
Whileexpertssaytheu.s.has some of the best water supplies in the world, aging municipal infrastructure and other potential environmental issues mean people shouldn’t take their water safety for granted, said Birnur K. Aral, the health, beauty and environmental sciences director at the Good Housekeeping Institute.
Although municipalities test water at the source, it can be contaminated along the way after it’s sent out, Round said. For homes built before 1990, the plumbing may have lead connectors from municipal water mains, which is where problems arise for homeowners.
In Southern Nevada, the region’s comparatively new water system is comprised of copper rather than lead pipes. Copper can leach into drinking water through plumbing, but the valley’s water agencies take steps to protect pipes so they don’t corrode.
Other contaminants, such as arsenic and uranium, are naturally occurring and can leach into a water system from the surrounding soil.
Do the kits detect water quality issues? Overall, yes.
The Good Housekeeping Institute worked with the Water Quality Lab at the University of Nebraska to measure the accuracy of commonly available water kits. Aral said the kit that came out tops in their tests was the Purtest Home Water Analysis Kit ($36.60, www.grainger.com), which accurately detected the contaminantsitsaiditwouldtest.
Other review websites like The Spruce cite kits from Watersafe,
First Alert ($15.95, www.firstalertstore.com) and Baldwin Meadows ($22.99, www.baldwin-meadows. com) as easy-to-use, accurate athome water test kits.
Before buying a kit, Aral said, homeowners in major cities should ask their water departments for the annual consumer confidence reports. These give a general overview of water quality and the regulated contaminants the municipality detected in the treated water, along with the level of contamination for the preceding calendar year. Some city water departments offer free or subsidized kits, Edwards said.
The majority of the at-home test kits use quick-read chemical strips to detect major hazards, including lead, some chemicals, some pesticides and bacteria. Most of these give indications on a pass/fail scale, rather than explaining how much of a certain substance may be in the water, Aral said.
“If you’re just really worried about leadandyoujustwanttogetaquick read without waiting to send something to a lab, this is a good start,” she said.
Consumers can also buy mail-in test kits, such as those from 120Wateraudit ($54, www.120waterdaudit. com), which has a basic lead testing kit, or Drinking Water Specialists ($129 www.drinkingwaterspecialists. com), which will test for 174 contaminants. These kits analyze water samples in their labs and send users the results.
Both Edwards and Aral say if the tests come back positive, it’s a sign the water contains that particular substance. From there, consumers can go to the Environmental Protection Agency’s website to find accredited labs for greater water testing if they choose, Aral said.
When consumers use these kits, they should consider them snapshots in time, because what’s in the water can change. The EPA recommends that people test municipal water annually.
Round and Aral said people who have well water should test more often, because it is at higher risk for bacteria contamination.