Here I sit in lovely, peaceful Selcuk, Turkey, a country ın whıch even locals don’t drınk the tap water (and so İ am requestıng advance dıspensation for typos due to Turkish keyboards, each one of which seems to be slightly dıfferent). OK, Turkey isn’t as poor as some countrıes, but bottled water has got to be a sıgnıfıcant part of the average household’s grocery budget.
What would be the cost of redoıng the water system of, say, a medıum-sized town lıke thıs one (population about 75,000)? At what poınt would it start to save the average famıly more in bottled water costs than the additional tax expense needed to redo the system? There has to be some kind of break-even poınt, rıght?
(And by the way, when İ lived ın Russia, it was more common for people to boıl water than buy bottled water. What’s up wıth that?
I can’t answer the question of what infrastructure costs, but the reason why people boil water is that it is cheaper than buying bottled water. I know that a lot of people in poorer parts of the world drink tea or coffee instead of water, partially because it has been boiled.
FWIW,
Rob
The water system is fine, it’s the sewer you need to redo. Water sitting unmolested in an aquifer should be fine to drink-- most municipal water systems in the US have very little filtration. The trouble is that communities don’t have adequate sewage treatment, if any at all, and just eject the sewage into the nearest body of water. If it’s a lake or a gaining stream (one that’s at the water table level), the sewage easily gets back into the water table and into whatever water source they’re using.
I don’t really have a lot of cost figures in my head, but I suspect that in most scenarios fixing the sewage system will be cheaper than installing water purification systems, which are generally quite expensive to operate.
Depends a lot on why the water is not potable.
Most likely bacteria is the main issue. That could be resolved with an ultraviolet filter or a chemical feed system. For basic systems in the US generally your looking at 1,000-2,000USD. Other contaminates could be the issue VOC’s, arsenic, radon, lead, etc. Each case of water impurities is handled differently. They is no one system that covers everything. Some water may require one system other water may require a series of treatment processes.