I live in TN (east) at the moment. Even though funds have been hard to find I have tried to be prepared for disasters (man or nature). The one thing I have just started investigating is water. Anyone around east TN knows that there has been a drought but thanks be it is raining today. My local water company has asked us to conserve water and now has told us to boil water. Of couse water is the one thing I do not have a large store of. I believe this points to an interesting problem that many survivalist will want to think about. As "civilization" grows and towns grow larger and people live on thanks to modern medicine the resources we consume grow smaller. I am not a doomsday prophet but I can read. If we continue to grow in the method we are will my children or grandchildren have food? Will the water supply be enough to supply drinking and other needs? I think these are basic questions that should be asked when laying up our stores.

Let your truck idle all day long and use hair spray. That extra bit will help the greenhouse gases melt a little more polar ice for us to drink.

Seriously tho, a good point. You can't manufacture water if it isn't there. And if it is brackish you need a way to make it potable pr you gucci gear and guns will be worthless.

You can obtain water in a survival situation! Several tarps suspended by the corners in an open area with a small hole in the center will catch more than you think overnite! Have wide mouth bottle or pan under hole!

Bear Wanderer,

The loss of city water in year area is nothing new.

Your best bet if you intend to stay in that area is to develop a cistern or better yet drill a well.

ConSigCor My greatest problem is lack of choices. I live in an apartment so I do not have a choice where to water comes from. I also do not know what they put in the water. I could spend the money to get a reverse osmosis filtration and then store it with the proper precaution but this is pricey. I have read different articles on this forum about chlorine in water. All I have to say is that I have worked with it and I do not believe it is safe. There was and is a danger of chlorine gas if it is not handled properly. As soon as I have better choices I will make them. If someone can point me to a filtration system to take chlorine out of water (not reverse osmosis filtration) please let me know.
BW

Bear, I don't know about filtration, but distillation should do it. That'll remove pretty much anything from water, since impurities (i.e., anything but water) can't remain in the water when it changes state from liquid to gas. Of course, if said impurities have a boiling point lower than water, they will boil off first, and depending on your setup you could get them right back in your water anyway. If you could keep the water at 210 F for a while, just in case of anything with a boiling point lower than water, that should do it. I can't think of anything that would be in water that would have a lower boiling point, but it's possible.

Really shouldn't be that hard to make a still for this kind of thing, either. A tea kettle or pressure cooker, some copper tubing, and whatever you want the water to go into for storage.

I might have to try this sometime.

If you use some kind of vented bung (provided you keep your water in a drum like me) and the water has chlorine in it, there would be no buildup of chlorine gas. Unless you put chlorination in your water yourself, municipalities use very little when chlorinating water for use by residents of that city. Therefore, you should have no fear of chlorine gas buildup. I work with it everyday, not to mention other chemicals. Chlorine is absolutely hazardous if mixed with say Hydrochloric acid(muriatic)which will definitely emit chlorine gas. In water I would say that you have little to worry about really.

I do not mind the chlorine so much as the chlorine mixed with iron in water. I do not know if it is because we have low water around here but the water has a horrible iron taste and some days it seems as if clay has gotten into the water. I may try that distilling idea, any idea if it takes the chlorine taste out?

If you distill water doesn't it actually turn to vapor and then back to water? If it does during distilling then I believe all impurities would be distilled out of the water.

Many chemicals have a lower boiling point than water, and will be carried over into the distillate. An an example, alcohol has a boiling point of about 175 degrees. If you were trying to get pure water or pure alcohol, you would have to distill the alcohol out first, then distill the water into a separate container.

If you are trying to remove chlorine or fluoride from the water (or pesticide residue or other contaminants), you have to monitor the temperature closely as you run the distillation.

Onward and upward,
airforce

If its the taste and or pallatability your worried about look into getting an activated carbon filtration system or just get a small 4 x 10 carbon filter cartridge system. I believe they sell them at sam waltons atrocity and or some other stores. It may take a little plumbing to get it installed and it'll most likely be just for a single faucet. Since your in an apartment. As far as potability goes the chlorine they add is probably barely enough to kill the bacteria in the water. So believe it or not the poison is actually helping to keep you alive and healthy. But like I said look into carbon filtration it removes particulate matter,unpleasant flavor and odor making the drinking experience more pleasant. Or you could just stick to beer(that's my method.)