cross-posted from: https://europe.pub/post/47526
Absolutely not something to be given for granted.
Shoutout to u/UnusualInstance6 on Reddit
Water is, unironically, my favourite drink on this earth.
this post was submitted on 25 Mar 2025
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Well, depends on either your definition of "drinkable" or "all" :D
I mean, you will find at least one spot in every EU country with drinkable tap water
Germany: Takes third option and buys bottled water. Part of the reason is that carbonated water is really popular, and home carbonators are usually kind of difficult/annoying to clean properly. Also, restaurants often won't serve tap water due to greed.
I'll never understand countries where restaurants don't serve tap water for free... It feels so greedy (as you say) and doesn't make me want to eat there...
It was a big struggle for me in germany. I have a condition that makes swallowing food very difficult and have to essentially "push" food down with a lot of water.
I would easily need to buy 2-3 .75l bottles per meal, so instead I bought 1 bottle and brought a reusable water bottle to every restaurant. No one complained, and I did always buy at least a drink.
But if you just let me have tap water, or even have tap water after purchasing a drink I could have enjoyed a meal without rationing my water.
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The biggest brand of home carbonators (Soda Stream) is an Israeli brand. Just something to think about.
I drink Sprudelwasser with dinner and the rest of the day it's just tap water. We live in an incredibly hard water area so tap water is basically mineral water.
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Tap water decreases your microplastic exposure by 90%.
Fr?
Compared to bottled water, oh yeah. Here's some articles from various places:
https://www.nih.gov/news-events/nih-research-matters/plastic-particles-bottled-water
https://time.com/6553165/microplastics-in-bottled-water-study/
https://www.npr.org/2024/01/10/1223730333/bottled-water-plastic-microplastic-nanoplastic-study
I just took some I recognised as "ok" sources, but there are thousands of articles about it elsewhere too.
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The amount of bottled water in the EU is insane, lol. I'd always Google it just to be sure, but the tap water is always drinkable, so I try to do that instead of buying a ton of bottles (or getting them at restaurants. I wish parts of the EU had more water fountains and refill stations for metal water bottles.
I'm guessing it's more of a cultural thing from the postwar reconstruction?
It's not always drinkable, especially not as a tourist.
I wouldn't drink tap water in Crete for instance
Officially tap water in Malta is drinkable but somehow several hotels I visited have instructed not to drink tap water and office I used had water filters installed on tap.
There is problems in EU countries too so I would not always trust the official declaration especially when country has higher level corruption - example like Malta.
The reason behind bottled water is a mixture of bad taste, hardness and lack of trust for watter supply (age related thing). Hence why additional filters have become somewhat popular (from small bottles with built-in filters that you fill on the go up to large separate installations that filter water for entire house). Everything depends on type of water available in certain areas. Cities by the mountains are the best in that aspect as they are often supplied with water directly from the mountains.
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Not feasible to drink tap water in every EU country though.
Even worse, it's not caffeinated in any EU country.
LPT if you are getting "coffee" every day at Starbucks or Dunkin Donuts, a cheap home expresso machine will pay itself in a month. As a bonus you have the option of using actual coffee.
Making things at home will almost always be cheaper but ignores the rituals embedded into capitalism.
That cup of coffee you make at home before you leave does not possess the same psychological comfort as the one you have at the end of your commute just before walking into the office.
Our brain is wired to want specific inputs at specific times in relation to our environment and i sometimes feel like the entire work commute culture is designed to exploit it.
Going somewhere after work to blow of steam has the same vibe. Nothing wrong with that on permis but the opportunity to get you to spend is well understood in business.
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What european water filter do you guys use for tap water ?
I personally use Brita, which is from Germany (and not Britain or Brittany)
None. I live in Austria and you can drink the tap water without any additional filters.
I'm Canadian. I drink unfiltered tap water my whole life.
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Brita is the most popular here as well. I have a water jug from them. While the tap water is perfectly drinkable here I like to filter the water I use for tea and coffee. The tea tastes better and the coffee machine gets less limescale.
Also worth mentioning BWT (Austrian brand) home filtering systems and water filter manufacturers. My sister has on of them fancy kitchen taps with built-in filtered water option and it uses a big BWT filter.
Why would you filter it?
My tap water is hard af and filtering helps with that. Also tastes slightly better and doesn't leave limescale stains after being filtered.
Limescale is magnesium and calcium... Hard tapwater is the best water for you.
For your washing machine, clothes, kitchenware though, not so great....
Here's the solution: use clear vinegar instead of fabric softener. It won't stink once it's dry. Promise.
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Are you American? Who needs filters for tap water?
When I lived in Warsaw tap water tasted like public swimming pool water after boiling old shoe for an hour.
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No need to resolve to anti-americanism, water is fine where I live, it just tastes better with a filter
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US: 100/100 Score. Looking at you, Flint Michigan :D I don't know what cherrypicking bullshit they had to do to get that result.
Yale University’s Environmental Performance Index, which tracks 40 performance indicators—including “Sanitation & Drinking Water”—in order to pinpoint the most environmentally friendly countries in the world. Additional performance indicators tracked by the EPI include environmental health, climate change mitigation, air quality, waste management, biodiversity, fishery populations, and more.
Sounds a bit like "stuff in place doing things" rather than actual quality tests. If so a bit of greenwashing seems feasible.
Sounds more like a development index than a quality index.
Which is even wilder. They are acting like agricultural and oil-drilling practices in the US (and elsewhere too) are not degrading the global fresh water base.
This is propaganda.
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Better for your teef as well.
In some EU countries it's pretty bad tasting though. Too much chlorine for me to really get used to.
Most places treat their water with chlorine or chloramine. Way better than having amoebas but if you can afford a filter do so. Different municipalities treat water differently, look yours up or test to see what you need. I went from carbon filters for chloramine to RO after moving somewhere with worse water
I guess it's more like most places in some regions.
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Where I grew up it they get 44% pumped groundwater, and 56% from capped sources in the surrounding hills. The water from the sources is UV light treated to kill any organic contaminants, the ground water didn't need it.
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Where I lived during high school it was all ground water filtered in three stages: ozone, activated carbon, and pH rebalancing, because it was close to a major river that leads into the Rhine.
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Where I live now we get 85% groundwater, and 15% from sources with UV treatment for the sources only again.
So you can imagine that I'm not used to the taste. Visiting some regions in Italy where they chlorinated their water pretty hard, especially in summer, is always kind of a shock taste wise. Though to be fair I gotta say in Torino where I was last year it was completely fine.
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