Water Storage

[Hardwood83]

What are the rules on long-term water storage? Are regular 16 oz water bottles good for long term storage or is there some shelf-life? Temperature concerns, etc? I am thinking more about a few days supply for my family as opposed to stocking 55gal drums- but whatever insights you have are appreciated.

[bkoenig]

I believe the big thing is to keep it away from direct sunlight, to avoid algae growth.

[Jesse T]

Buy a couple cases of bottled water and store em in your basement.  There is an expiration date by law on the bottles but the water doesn't 'go bad'.  20 bucks will buy you 5 cases or so or, 50l of water, which is  5 days worth for a 5 person family, (2l a day/person) or more if your family is less, even more if you can limit to 1l a day or whatnot.  

[Hardwood83]

Cool- that's what I assumed, but wondered if there was a risk of something growing after so long. Thanks fellas.
I saw some on sale, I think I'll pick up a few cases.

[Jesse T]

If you have sealed prepackaged containers not in sunlight your risk is really really low.  If you re-use 2l bottles or other bottles and seal them back up yourself, the risk goes up.    I've been storing cases in my garage for years with no adverse affects yet.  Then again I try to rotate my way through them, Probably the longest i've had stored is maybe 2 years. 

[ScottC]

You can buy the water in gallon sized jugs for a fraction of what the individual bottles cost (distilled runs less than $1/gal in this area), and like posted earlier: rotation and 'expiration' dates are the correct course of action.

[bkoenig]

If you go to the grocery store you can get 5 gallon bulk containers and either fill them up from the store's RO machine or fill it yourself with water an 1/2 teaspoon of bleach.

[A-FIXER]

/\ + 1 on the clorine bleach the thing that causes the water to go bad is when a person drinks out of the bottle water saliva that goes back into the bottle has bactercia then the water is funked if you kids have a tendency to drink out of gal jugs wash out and and add the clorine to perserve the water..

[Aldo]

Can't go wrong with having a hand-pump filter in the "bunker" in case one needs to filter their stored water during a long-term emergency....also handy to "filter" the water stored in the hot water tanks, toilet backs, and tubs (if one is fortunate to fill them at the time of a water shutdown emergency).

I've got that filter along with numerous cases of bottled water, two 55gal barrels (rotate the water/bleach combo every six months....used to have three but gave 1 away after Y2K never took place...wish I had it back), and a dozen 5gal containers (same timeline rotation)...the barrels and containers are "blue" containers specifically made for long-term water storage.  At least 2 months worth of water for the fam...and am working up to longer time frame than that.  By that point (actually even beforehand), civil disorder will have already been set in anyways....so don't also forget the food stuff in the "bunker", too.  The barrels also can come with "hand pumps" for dispensing the water at the time of using it as well as for draining the barrels for the water rotation cycle.