July 27, 2009
Garden Hose Dangers and Recommendations
© 2009 Brad Lancaster, www.HarvestingRainwater.com
Many garden hoses leach lead and other chemicals into the water as it sits in the hose. Polyvinyl chloride (PVC) and brass fittings are often the culprits.
Yuck - the water tastes like lead!
To reduce such risk, purchase, use, and/or drink only from hoses labeled safe for drinking water. Never buy any hose with such labeling as “WARNING: This product contains a chemical in the State of California to cause cancer and birth defects or other reproductive harm.” Note that such warnings will typically be in very small print.
A May 2005 Consumer Reports article, “Dare you drink from a garden hose?” reports that hoses labeled safe for drinking leach minuscule concentrations of lead into water standing in the hose, while hoses not labeled drinking water safe leached up to 10 to 100 times allowable lead levels into water standing in the hose.
So, flush any hose before you drink from it by letting the water run a while before you gulp.
Suppliers of hoses labeled safe for drinking water include:
• Gatorhyde Drinking Water Safe Garden Hose: Available in 3/4-inch diameter, but upon inspection I found that it constricts down to 5/8th-inch interior diameter.
• Armadillo Hoses: Available in 5/8-inch diameter, but upon inspection I found that it constricts down to less than 1/2-inch interior diameter – closer to 3/8-inch. For a list of their NSF-51 certified hoses, click here.
Note that these are far better than most, but not perfect. Gatorhyde contains polyurethane, while Armadillo contains a less toxic PVC. Both polyurethane and PVC are banned materials in the Living Building Challenge Materials Red List (Prerequisite Five). The Living Building Challenge is an integrated green building guide that goes well beyond LEED.
Note for anyone using gravity to move water through a hose from a rainbarrel or rainwater tank – get 3/4-inch (best) or 5/8-inch (next best) interior diameter hose instead of 1/2-inch interior diameter. The larger the interior diameter, the less surface friction will reduce your low gravity-fed pressure.
Also make sure your rain barrel or cistern faucet does not constrict its interior diameter to less than 3/4 of an inch. Look inside the valve. Unfortunately, most readily available valves reduce interior diameter to 1/4 of an inch, greatly reducing your gravity-fed pressure.
July 31st, 2009 at 11:21 am
Great post. The hose is something that most people don’t even think about when taking a drink.. lead in a hose, who would have thought? I can’t recall the number of times I drank from the hose as a kid… What is really disturbing is that lead has been a known contaminant for a long time, and every hose manufacturer knows that children drink out of the hose frequently, yet they are still including lead…
August 10th, 2009 at 9:26 pm
I have to disagree about children drinking out of water hoses. I remember doing it as a kid and even a few times as an adult but in the last 20 years the onslaught of water bottles and bottled water has changed our culture. We have been taught to “hydrate, hydrate!!” and we carry water bottles with us at all times. We’ve even taught our dog to drink from our water bottles. That said, I bought a hose from Costco a few years ago and it was clearly labeled ‘not for drinking water’. I returned it, not because I planned to drink from it but because I figured the water that ran through it would go on my yard and my garden and it seemed imprudent to introduce unsafe chemicals into my environment.
August 12th, 2009 at 3:22 pm
[...] >Los Angeles westside property owners can trap your own rain if they apply for the city’s new rainwater harvesting program. If you’re looking to set up your own rain harvesting system (like Homegrown Evolution details here) check out creek freak’s favorite water harvesting expert Brad Lancaster’s recommendations for selecting the least toxic hose. [...]
August 19th, 2009 at 10:22 am
I had no idea about the lead. I’m a homebrewer and we only use potable water RV hose (generally white with a blue stripe along it) to make our beer. I’ve also read that there is anti fungal chemicals in a typical garden hose too that are not good for you.
October 1st, 2009 at 2:37 am
When I had to replace one of my hoses, I discovered that, as Robert mentioned, most garden hoses have anti-fungal chemicals embedded in the material – eek! So I went looking for a rubber hose. I found an all rubber hose at Sears… black. When I handle the hose, black comes off on my hands, so I am not very confident that it does not end up in the water that comes out of it – but I don’t know what that means… I do know that PVC not only off-gasses toxic chemicals but that lots of bad stuff is emitted during the making of it and destroying of it. Anything to avoid the production of more plastic or PVC.