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People with experience working in and around municipal water infrastructure: Do you drink tap water? Are there times when you do not? (lemmy.world)

submitted 8 months ago by j4k3@lemmy.world to c/asklemmy@lemmy.ml

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This question is obviously intended for those that live in places where tap water is "safe to drink."

I live in Southern California, where I'm at the end of a long chain of cities. Occasionally, the tap smells of sulfur, hardness changes, or it tastes... odd. I'm curious about the perspective of people that are directly involved and their reasoning.

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[–] ricecake@sh.itjust.works 13 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I'm in mid Michigan, and you're fine. The circumstances that lead (ba-dum) to the issues in Flint are unlikely to occur elsewhere, particularly if you're closer to Detroit.

[–] EveryMuffinIsNowEncrypted@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I live in Monroe County.

[–] ricecake@sh.itjust.works 3 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Yeah, you're fine. The issue with flint was because they moved away from the supply that you're on.

[–] EveryMuffinIsNowEncrypted@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

they moved away from the supply that you’re on.

As in, that's what they did before the massive catastrophe that was "everybody gets cancer in the everything", to paraphrase, right?

[–] ricecake@sh.itjust.works 3 points 8 months ago

Correct.

Flint was on the Detroit water supply, and then tried to save money by switching to one that the pipes couldn't handle, which damaged the protective coating on the pipes and let lead leach into the water.
After the coating was damaged there was no real way to fix it that was better than "replace the pipes", which was on the agenda anyway.

Lead pipes are bad, but they're typically safe enough that it's not an emergency due to the coating. It's a worldwide effort to replace lead pipes with other materials that's usually happening roughly inline with the usual service replacement schedule, but some places are going faster because of public concern or just a good opportunity. (My local water supply got the budget to do it while doing a different project, so it took two or three times as long, but happened a few decades early and was much cheaper, then when Flint happened they looked great by being able to respond to questions by saying they started years ago and are almost done)