Question:
You're not speaking for THIS homeowner. Every year several small townsin Minnesota get their wells polluted and run under a "boil" order forseveral weeks. Royal pain in the a**, plus the boil order only comesAFTER the problem has been discovered -- how many "stomach virus" caseshappen before the problem is discovered by periodic tests? I'd ratherhave my water chlorinated.

The sale of bottled water has nothing to do with taste (of either type)and everything to do with style.

Answer: There ya go again, making assumptions about what homeownerswant or think. First of all, this is NOT a website of homeowners...it's"home.repair", which includes a lot of other folks besidesdim-witted homeowers who need to be told what they like and dislike.Secondly, you are probably correct in stating that homeowners don'tLIKE chlorinated water. And many of them also don't LIKE stoplightsor childhood vaccinations or needing to refrigerate things after theyopen them. But, hey, like Dan says...think of the alternatives.Let's go back to the time when municipalities didn't chlorinate theirwater. They just served it up fresh from the Mississippi River, orSaugahatchee Lake, or the local canal. And people died of cholera andtyphoid fever and many other intestinal ailments that are nowprevented quite nicely by chlorination (and sewage treatment). Idon't care to debate the pro's and con's of the metabolic by-productsof chlorination vs. ozone, because I'm not a chemist. I DO know thatboth processes oxidize things, and that ANY chemical acting as astrong oxidant is/can be toxic, depending on the circumstances.That's why they kill microorganisms.

As for the "proof" of your argument being in the sales of bottledwater etc.....I've been around long enough to know that chlorinatedwater supplies pre-dated the current craze for bottled water by manydecades. IMHO, people buy bottled water in part because they've beenled to believe that their own water supplies are not safe. Ever watchone of those water-filter commercials? They mention removingchlorine, but they really focus on removing lead and other "toxic"substances (as if chlorine isn't toxic). It's interesting that atleast one well-known producer of water treatment devices now includesa disclaimer in the fine print of their promotional literature.Beneath the scary pictures and statements about harmful substancestheir equipment will remove from your water is the comment, "NOTE:Your water may not contain any of these substances." In this country,marketing is everything.