Water for Weight Loss
April 13, 2020
Listen in to learn how drinking water helps with weight loss and why the quality of water is so important. Water Expert Richard Grassie joins us to share about the contaminants found in tap water and why it is important to filter your water.
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Transcript:
JOANN: Welcome to Dishing Up Nutrition brought to you by Nutritional Weight and Wellness. I'm JoAnn Ridout. I'm a Registered and Licensed Dietitian. And joining me as our co-host is Carolyn Hudson, who's also a Registered and Licensed Dietitian. Today we have the pleasure of having our local water expert, Richard Grassie, owner of Richard's Custom Water Systems with us. He's here to share his expertise about the contaminants found in tap water and why it's so important to filter your water. Our goal this morning is to discuss a variety of information about the importance of water; filtered water. And today we are especially focusing on how drinking water helps with weight loss and why the quality of water is so important.
CAROLYN: Well, good morning everyone. JoAnn, I remember when you told us a story about your additional drinking water, extra glasses of water and how it helped you lose several pounds. So I know our listeners love, love to hear some of our testimonials and stories. So would you mind sharing that with us?
JOANN: Sure, I can do that. In our Nutrition for Weight Loss classes, we give our class participants a handout that says “water is the single most important catalyst in losing weight and keeping it off”. This handout has eight key biochemical reasons that drinking water supports weight loss. So I thought to myself, “I want to test this information out.” So I added a couple extra glasses, which is about three cups of water daily. And the good news is in two weeks, I lost four pounds. I didn't change what I was eating. I didn't change my exercise. I didn't change my sleep. I just drank three additional cups of filtered water every day. So I also know that coffee is dehydrating. So I was basically trying to offset that.
CAROLYN: To compensate for that, right?
JOANN: Yeah, that coffee. And so that was my goal was to just drink a little more water from that standpoint. So in our Nutrition for Weight Loss classes, we teach about the importance of drinking water. But I wanted to prove it to myself so I could personally say, “I know drinking water supports weight loss is true because it happened for me.”
CAROLYN: Yeah. You know, when you shared that with us, I think it was at one of our nutritionist meetings, I think all of us went, “Oh my gosh, we got to share that with our listeners because that's really impactful.
JOANN: It is.
CAROLYN: And it is motivational and who doesn't like to hear a good success story, right? So today we are actually going to take our first half of the show to discuss some of the reasons that sufficient consumption of water results in that weight loss. And then during the second half of the show, we will address the importance of the quality of the water. So let's get started with why it is that we need water for weight loss. The first thing I always think of and one of the most important reasons to drink sufficient water is that your kidneys cannot function properly without the water.
JOANN: That's right. And that is so important. When your kidneys don't have enough water to function well, the liver takes over some of the kidney’s workload. So the problem is the liver’s job is breaking down and metabolizing stored fat into energy. And if the liver is doing some of the kidneys work, it can't operate at full speed, which means less fat is going to be metabolized. It's going to affect your metabolism and you won't lose as much weight.
CAROLYN: Right, so drinking water is really the key to that fat metabolism because it actually allows the kidneys to function properly and then that weight loss occurs. So a lot of our clients really struggle with that and this, just knowing that fact…
JOANN: Right.
CAROLYN: …helps them then or encourages them to drink a little more water. Right?
JOANN: Yeah.
CAROLYN: So how do you go about making sure you are actually drinking enough water? So I'm going to challenge every one of you out there, all of our listeners to make a commitment to drink at least 10 glasses of water daily. I'm talking 10, eight-ounce glasses of filtered water every day. In fact, since water supports weight loss and your immune function, we're going to challenge you to drink that much water for at least the next two weeks. Maybe it should be more like four or six or eight or forever so that, you know, maybe you'll lose some weight at first. And how great is that? But the other thing is this is really important right now. It is going to help your, strengthen your immune system. So that's really essential during this crisis epidemic that we have right now.
JOANN: That's for sure. And I also want to share some more important facts about water. So number one: 75% of Americans are chronically dehydrated. And that's not too surprising to me because I look at health histories and very few people are drinking adequate amounts of water. So the second fact is 37% of Americans think they're hungry when they just need to drink a glass of water. So think about this: every time you are hungry, have a glass of water first.
CAROLYN: Yeah.
JOANN: It's going to help your weight loss process immensely. And the third is that dehydration can slow down your metabolism.
CAROLYN: Absolutely. So here's another interesting fact: Every day our body loses two and a half to three quarts of water daily. Okay? You know that's almost a hundred ounces, right? That is 12 eight ounce glasses of water a day; even more if you're outside and you're sweating; you're in the heat. So if you're having any trouble losing weight, try drinking more water for a few days to get your body actually ready to lose that weight. Remember, when your kidneys don't have enough water to detox naturally, your liver takes over part of the job of the kidneys and then it's not available…
JOANN: Right.
CAROLYN: …to help you lose that way.
JOANN: That's right. Your metabolism suffers for sure. So here's another reason for you to drink some water: when we don't drink enough water, we get dry skin, wrinkles, may suffer from constipation or fluid retention, and even high blood pressure. Yes, I said high blood pressure. So the first time I learned this, I was really an “aha” moment for me about how the blood pressure's affected by dehydration. But it is interesting that good hydration makes your heart, which is a pump work better. So your blood pressure’s affected. So maybe you can reduce your medication or maybe you can reduce your blood pressure with water. Here's another fairly unknown fact: overweight people need more water to metabolize their stored fat. The National Center for Health Statistics estimates that two out of three adults are currently either overweight or obese. So based on that information, it would appear that two out of three adults need to drink more filtered water every single day.
CAROLYN: So, and you would really think, JoAnn, that drinking water to lose weight would be an easy thing.
JOANN: Right.
CAROLYN: But it's not. And you know, you have to try to figure out different ways to get that much water in. So I have, many of my clients are teachers. I'm sure you do too. What do they tell you? I can't drink that water because I have to get up and go to the bathroom and I can't do that.
JOANN: Right.
CAROLYN: You know, they have a classroom full of students. So they have very limited bathroom breaks. So perhaps all of you out there right now, you're working at home. Maybe this is a challenge for you for the next, we don't know how many weeks.
JOANN: We don’t know.
CAROLYN: …at least four weeks. Start drinking more water. Try drinking eight, nine or 10 glasses of water a day and see if that helps your weight loss.
JOANN: That's right. When I tell my clients that water's a natural anti-aging nutrient and it prevents, it helps prevent sagging skin. It supports good brain function. Some of them can’t start drinking water soon enough, so some people are motivated by that.
CAROLYN: That wrinkle thing. I don't know. That always motivates me.
JOANN: For sure. Also, sometimes I have teenage clients. Some of them come to see me because they have acne. When I tell them, if you replace drinking your sodas with drinking water, there will be a big reduction in your acne breakouts. What a great feeling it is when these teenagers go from sulking to smiling and then thanking me for giving them such a simple solution. So water can be our “genie in a bottle” for many health conditions.
CAROLYN: Yeah, our teenagers love that when we tell them, “Oh, you can clear up some of your acne just by drinking a little more water.”
JOANN: Right.
CAROLYN: So as you may have noticed, we just love giving interesting facts to all of our listeners. So here's one more interesting fact about water that some of you already may be aware of. A person can actually go for weeks without food but can only go without water for a few days. Well, I think it's almost time for a break here, Joann.
JOANN: Yes it is.
CAROLYN: So you're listening to Dishing Up Nutrition. Today, we are discussing how you can use water to help your body lose weight. We also have a special guest, Richard Grassie. He's the owner of Richard's Custom Water Systems, and he's in studio with us today to share his expertise about water quality.
BREAK
JOANN: Welcome back to Dishing Up Nutrition. At Nutritional Weight and Wellness, we are still open for business both for nutrition consultations and for supplement purchases. However, to protect the safety of everyone, we've changed how the nutrition consultations and purchases will be carried out. Each of our dietitians and nutritionists are available for appointments by phone or video. As a dietitian, I personally have been very busy helping clients who are concerned about having a strong immune system and also helping my current clients and even new clients who have a variety of other nutrition problems and health issues. So do you have health concerns that you'd like help with? You can call (651) 699-3438 and we will set up your phone or video appointment, or if you prefer you can go to weightandwellness.com and book an appointment for yourself. So we have, I've been surprised at how busy we are. Very, very busy.
CAROLYN: I’m swamped.
JOANN: I’ve swamped too; very busy with people having questions about what's going on right now and keeping their health current.
CAROLYN: Exactly.
JOANN: And optimal. So if you're also, so we've been talking about water, but back to our water topic. If you're having some memory problems, here is one possible solution: drink more water because the brain is composed of about 75 to 85% water and consists of nearly 60% fat, which makes it the fattiest organ in our body.
CAROLYN: That's, that's really interesting isn't it?
JOANN: That is interesting.
CAROLYN: Yeah. I was kind of shocked to find that out.
JOANN: Yes, and drinking sufficient water and eating beneficial natural fats support brain function and memory. Most of the brain fat is omega-three DHA fatty acid.
CAROLYN: So I remember that Nancy Lindgren, our guest from last week's show, Food to Support Sobriety, said that she starts her day drinking a large glass of water. Supporting her brain function by drinking water and eating real food has really helped her achieve her 39 years of continuous sobriety. So water and food actually work together hand in hand for better brain function.
JOANN: So what does research say about how drinking water helps people lose weight? A study published in Obesity in September of 2015 found that “when middle aged and older adults drank water before each meal, they lost four and a half pounds in a 12-week period of time.”
CAROLYN: Wow, that's pretty good. That's great!
JOANN: And what an easy solution. In a year, they could potentially lose up to 18 pounds. All they did was drink a glass of water before each meal. Bottom line, drinking water helps us with weight loss.
CAROLYN: Well, cheers to that.
JOANN: That's right.
CAROLYN: Absolutely. That's really nice. So I want to share some of the ways that I get my water in every day. First of all, I drink a large glass of water right when I get up in the morning. And believe me, I love my coffee, but I also know coffee is a diuretic. So it you know, it dehydrates you. So by drinking a glass of water first thing in the morning, I'm protecting my body and my brain. And I'm not only just hydrating my brain, but I will actually probably drink less coffee. I'm sure I drink less coffee when I do that. And I try to do that every single morning. So the second thing I do is I drink herbal teas throughout the day. And occasionally, you know, that counts as part of my total water intake. And thirdly, I usually add some flavor to at least one of my glasses of water every day. And that could be some lemon, lime or orange slices. Or the other thing I really like, and right now this would be a really good thing to do is use some of our Key Greens and Fruit. So I put a, you know, maybe a quarter of a, a scoop of that into a glass of water and that, you know, adds a nice little subtle flavor. And the thing with the Key Greens and Fruits also, it helps, helps get you more antioxidants, you know, so and antioxidants are really good for your body. Basically, to drink enough water every day, you really need to have a well thought-out system in place. Sometimes we tell people, you know, put a pitcher of water out that the total amount of water that you should be drinking throughout the day and see how much you actually get in. Right? So drinking enough water is often a goal that most of my clients have because when they do, they're going to feel better and have more energy.
JOANN: And that's a goal for all of us, right?
CAROLYN: Yeah, absolutel
JOANN: So, Carolyn and I each have one more interesting fact to share with you about water. Water is a natural appetite suppressant. If you're feeling hungry, your body may be saying, “I am thirsty.” So we talked about this a little bit before, but really think about this: next time you feel hungry, try drinking one or two glasses of water first before you're thinking about… before your meal or before you need a meal or a snack. And it's amazing how well that works. Sometimes you find you're not even hungry.
CAROLYN: So here's the final fact that I'm going to share with you today. If you are experiencing fluid retention, one of the best ways to actually get rid of that extra fluid in your body is to drink more water. I know that sounds really counterintuitive.
JOANN: Yes.
CAROLYN: But it, and you know, this is a habit that is very difficult for most people to kind of wrap their head around. You know, if they have swollen ankles or whatever, I tell them, “Really, you actually need to drink more water.” And they go, “That doesn't make any sense.”
JOANN: Right.
CAROLYN: But, but if they do drink the right amount of water for their body, they, they will retain more water biochemically in, in the opposite direction inside the cells. So it won't cause that swelling.
JOANN: Right.
CAROLYN: It will be more balanced.
JOANN: Right.
CAROLYN: So drinking sufficient water actually releases that fluid retention and doesn't add to the fluid retention.
JOANN: That is a really hard concept for people to wrap their heads around, but definitely works.
CAROLYN: Yep.
JOANN: So another concern: have you ever had a memory problem or maybe a word recall problem? Your brain might be telling you you need to drink more water?
CAROLYN: Absolutely. I think a lot of us with all of this stress these last few weeks, we are having a little bit of recall type problems. So today, we have given you many reasons to drink enough water for weight loss as well as good brain and body function. So now what we want to do is switch gears a little bit and dig into the quality of the water. And Richard Grassie, he's the owner of Richard's Custom Water Systems. And he's here with us today. Richard, I have noticed that water quality has been in the news again lately. So recently there was an article titled Worry Over Water Safety and that, that was in the Star Tribune and it was about nitrates rising in rural tap water. Welcome Richard.
RICHARD: Well, thank you. Thank you both Carolyn and JoAnn for having me on the program. I'm delighted to be here. So water, water is in the news and it's, it doesn't surprise me because water's a universal solvent. But relating to nitrates, so nitrates are one of three chemicals or contaminants that are tested on all private wells, and the LABA limit is 10 parts per million of nitrates. Personally in my opinion, that's just a guideline because I don't consider eight or seven or six or five to be safe. You know, there have to have guidelines so that water in general that wells don't fail. But if we know anything about nitrates, and you ladies may already do, but it decreases the ability of the water to carry our, the oxygen-carrying ability of the blood. So it causes blue baby syndrome, which you may know. So it's not a good thing.
BREAK
JOANN: Welcome back to Dishing Up Nutrition. If you are having trouble sleeping, I encourage you to join the discussion next week of the importance of sleep and how you can get more of that. Also, we posted a special podcast on the Nutritional Weight and Wellness website, weightandwellness.com, that addresses how real food and key supplements can boost your immune system. If you have any questions or need nutritional support, give us a call at 651-699-3438 or email us at weightandwellness.com and we will answer you. And we've had a lot, a fair amount of questions regarding all of that information. So that special podcast is really helpful with more information about things to do with this virus. So back to our water topic; it seems more and more people are concerned about the quality of their tap water, so they're turning to drinking filtered water. And you just mentioned the difference between filter and purification. But when I'm teaching the Weight and Wellness classes, people often ask me if tap water is safe to drink. So how would you answer that question, Richard?
RICHARD: I would say that it's legally safe to drink.
CAROLYN: That’s a good description.
RICHARD: It's an upside down equation. You know, only 1% of all the water that comes into a person's home is used for what you'd call life support purposes, whether it's cooking, mixing, steaming vegetables; whatever. So when 99% is going down the drain, they can't make the water high, high quality. Does that make sense?
CAROLYN: Yup, that makes sense. 1%; that’s pretty low.
RICHARD: There are things I want to add to that but…
JOANN: So, and then, don't you come out and do testing, right?
RICHARD: Yes.
JOANN: So Carolyn lives in Eden Prairie and I live in Robbinsdale so…
RICHARD: So two completely different waters. So there's really kind of four, I look at it; there's four different types of waters. There's Mississippi or groundwater river water, which has its variables. Then we have city well water, which is most of the, as soon as you get out of the inner first inner circle of, of Minneapolis…
JOANN: Robbinsdale is part of that.
RICHARD: Robbinsdale has really excessively, has high, high dissolved solids in it. But Minneapolis, Golden Valley, Crystal, New Hope… those are all kind of getting their water from the Mississippi river. And then when you get to the next ring, those were all city wells.
CAROLYN: City wells. Okay.
RICHARD: And then if we go out of, out of, out of, into the country, now they're on private wells. So private wells and city wells typically both get their water from the same water source. It's from a slowly moving river called an aquifer. And the aquifer goes hundreds and hundreds of miles. So, Eden Prairie for example, is more like Mississippi river water kind of because they do treat it and have less hardness in the water as an example, and the dissolved solids in the water are less. But Robbinsdale is one of the highest in dissolved solids in the twin cities. It's Robbinsdale and Chaska that are… so, so we have, we have the, the simple chemicals that are suspended in the water in the form of a gas. And we have the difficult ones that were solid that are now totally dissolved in the water.
CAROLYN: Okay.
RICHARD: Okay. So we have two areas of improvement.
CAROLYN: Not all tap water is the same then, right?
RICHARD: No, it’s not. And the other big picture here is only 1% of what gets into water causes taste. So you can't tell water quality by taste. And when you make water cold you numb your ability to taste. So the big test of water for someone that has, has really had really good water and then they go and drink tap water, they really notice the difference because it's such an extreme, right? Because you're used to something and now it's, you get the subtle differences just because you're used to it. But we cannot tell water quality by taste.
JOANN: Right. So how do you determine if someone should filter their water?
RICHARD: Well, you know for me that's a little bit of a loaded question. Because of what I know, I think everyone should do something to their water. You know, again, if we, if we're living in a country and I don't, did I say earlier that we, there's a hundred over a hundred thousand manmade chemicals?
CAROLYN: No you didn’t. A hundred…
RICHARD: Over a hundred thousand manmade chemicals currently in use in the United States.
CAROLYN: Ok, and you're saying that those are all possibly in our water?
RICHARD: Whatever water comes in contact with. So water is the universal solvent. So we have that 100,000 and we have a thousand new ones every year. And if you paint a picture, only 1% of all those variables that can find their way in the water cause taste. So things are silently in our water. They're not saying, “I'm in here.” Right? They’re not telling us.
CAROLYN: They're silently in there.
RICHARD: And so the safe water drinking act of 1974 that initially had cities test for 22 chemicals about 40 years later; now cities are mandated by law to test for about a hundred. So the big picture about that is that's a, that's a drop in the bucket to the potential
CAROLYN: That’s scary.
RICHARD: I don't want it to be scary, but water's a big deal.
JOANN: It is.
RICHARD: People are, for the 35 years that I’ve been in the water business, it used to be people would say, “Isn’t our water fine?” And it's exact opposite of that now. Most people realize that they should do something to their water. And when we think of if we're 70 or so percent water, shouldn't that be at the top of our priority?
CAROLYN: It definitely should be.
JOANN: Absolutely.
RICHARD: And the other thing I know that both of you know, there isn't a single function that takes place in our body without water.
JOANN: Right.
CAROLYN: Exactly. We were just talking; our body doesn't function very well without adequate amount of water.
RICHARD: So and again, I still haven't really answered this thing about testing. So, so the, the chemical suspended in the form of a gas are so easy to remove; simple filtration to remove them or at least reduces them. A simple filter in a refrigerator will reduce those, which is why the filter in the refrigerator, it's called the taste notre filter. Or if you screw something up onto your faucet that the water goes right through and comes right out, that's a simple filter. That would take out taste, that would take out the easy things. It will not address the difficult things, which were the dissolved solids and those are measurable.
CAROLYN: Right; right. Okay. So a lot of my clients will say, “I have a refrigerator filter.”
RICHARD: Right.
CAROLYN: And I think, okay, that's like a one level carbon filter, right? Am I right in thinking that?
RICHARD: Yes.
CAROLYN: So that's only going to take out how much?
RICHARD: Well, it's, it's, it's going to deal with the chemical suspended in the water in the form of a gas. So living in Eden Prairie… so the difficult things in water are, are called parts per million; are measured in parts per million of totally dissolved solids; solids that are now totally dissolved in the water. So if you go buy bottled water in a store as an example, and it says “purified water” to make that claim, it cannot measure more than 10 parts per million.
CAROLYN: Okay.
RICHARD: Eden Prairie is going to have somewhere between 90 and about 200 parts per million in their water. Robbinsdale is over 500 to give you a difference.
JOANN: Wow.
RICHARD: So those dissolved solids are the things, that's where heavy metals, lead, nitrate salt, salt based substances, that's where fluoride is. That's where pharmaceuticals are found. That's where the newest big concern in our country isn't necessarily… pharmaceuticals are there. They're not on the list of a hundred, so nobody has to test for them, but they're being found all over the country. The newest issue is the microplastics.
CAROLYN: Microplastics; yes.
RICHARD: Or the personal care products, so they're not on the list so that nobody has to test for them. That's a national issue.
CAROLYN: Yeah. Yeah. And I think it didn't, weren't we talking about the estrogens too?
JOANN: The estrogens.
CAROLYN: …on a recent show?
JOANN: Beginning of March we had a show…
CAROLYN: Yeah.
JOANN: …about the estrogens in water and other things.
RICHARD: Everything that we're putting back into the, we're in a closed system. There isn't any more water on the planet now than at the beginning of time. So whatever we're doing today ends up in somebody else's water. I mean, that's not a nice thought, but it's all recycled.
JOANN: These things you're talking about, the dissolved solids, and the, and the drugs and things like that. So we need to have reverse osmosis in order to get to that level?
RICHARD: Well, yes, yes. The thing to know about reverse osmosis though is reverse osmosis is a technology. It is not a given water purity. There's more crappy systems in my mind sold in our marketplace and in this country than good ones. So people go, “Oh, I'm going to buy an RO and I'll buy this one.” Right?
CAROLYN: Well, I hear that all the time.
RICHARD: It takes the taste out. But when we go, cause I, we take them out all the time out of people's homes; all the time, especially once people realize they're not really doing what they think. Cause you can measure the level of in parts per million of dissolved solids to see how effective a system is. Does that make sense? So we take, so I was very disillusioned when I first came into the industry 35 years ago, I was told that I sold the best RO made and it removed 99% of the, of, of, of the contaminants in water. So I'm out there saying “We've got the best one.” Should I tell the story now or do you want to have…?
JOANN: We’ll continue this story after break.
CAROLYN: So you're listening to Dishing Up Nutrition. I want to remind you that we are offering individual nutrition counseling by phone or video. All of our online classes are available with many different topics at weightandwellness.com. And we have staff answering calls and emails. So please call us or email us if you have questions. We have free shipping on all of our supplements and we continue to offer corporate classes via our webinars. And we'll be right back.
BREAK
JOANN: Welcome back to Dishing Up Nutrition. So many people just do not realize that good intestinal health is key to having a strong immune system. I encourage you to read a blog written by Licensed Nutritionist, Elizabeth Leppart, called Our Most Recommended Probiotic: Bifido Balance. Again, I emphasize that good intestinal health is a key to strong immune function, and that's a supplement that we always start with when we're working with someone.
CAROLYN: Great probiotic.
JOANN: Yes.
CAROLYN: So Richard, we, before we went to break, you were telling us a story.
RICHARD: Well, yes, sorry. So yes; and so it was when I came into the industry over 35 years ago, and I'm selling this, I'm working for a local water company, water treatment company, and they're telling me that they have the best RO. And so I’m saying, “We've got the best RO; it removes 99% of what’s in the water.” And I, my territory was the Southeast metro, the Farmington, Lakeville, Rosemont was my neighbor, the area that I worked in and I sold a water softener and this name-brand RO system to this family. I'm in that development about a month later and I'm early for my appointment. So I thought, why not just knock on these folk’s door and show them what a great decision they made? So I went in with my, with my meter and I measured the water and it was 75% pure, not 99% pure. So a month old system was already letting 25% of the difficult things, the dissolved solids, pass through it.
JOANN: Wow.
CAROLYN: A month old?
RICHARD: Yes. And that made me a liar. I mean we’re still responsible for everything we say, right? But the good news is it took me on a journey to find out is there an American manufacturer that does this properly? And so I went and the company's called Aquathin; they're out in Florida. And I went on my own shortly after that. I took all their training and I've had the rights of that product ever since. And now we have 30, over 30 years of history on how effective this device is and there's still nothing on the marketplace that keeps water at this very pristine level of around one to two parts, and a year later when we're back to maintain it, our thing is we always want to keep it below 10 because the definition of purified water is that it cannot measure more than 10 parts per million. If it's 11 it's not, it can’t be called purified water anymore.
CAROLYN: And I know, I always tell my clients, and I'm sure you do too, Joann, if you're going to buy bottled water, at least buy purified water. Don't buy spring water because that's not regulated in any way.
JOANN: Right.
RICHARD: That’s absolutely correct.
CAROLYN: So you might as well just be drinking your tap water. So a few years ago the Environmental Working Group found 83 different agricultural pollutants such as pesticides and the chemicals from fertilizers and even manure-laden runoff pollutants. They also found industrial chemicals like bacteria, hormones, drug residues, herbicides, and more. So Richard, you're telling us about all these particles.
RICHARD: Yes.
CAROLYN: Can we actually determine if there are specific drug residues in our water?
RICHARD: Right. So when we go out, when I go out or when my crew goes out, we're going to do a simple test where if we test for the level of totally dissolved solids, it's all the dissolved salt in one number.
CAROLYN: Right.
RICHARD: So if that has pharmaceuticals as part of it, or if that has arsenic as part of it or if that has whatever; hexavalent chromium or pharmaceuticals or whatever, that would be a separate test of number of tests; because you have to test her everything separately. And that would go to a lab so people would have to go to a lab.
JOANN: Okay.
RICHARD: So, and if people say, “Well, I'm concerned that my water has the PFAS that is on the east side of the city, the 3M issue, right? And I'll say, “Well, it's a concern, but there's so much else going on. You could spend a bunch of money and test for it and you'll know today.” But what's, what's happening a month later? You don't know. So my whole thing is, I'm not so specific on what's in our water because we know there's multiple things there we don't want. And when we get to city water, and not to make cities bad, when you add chlorine or chloramines to water... So we use chlorine as a disinfectant for water supply. When chlorine interacts with manmade chemicals called synthetic organic chemical compounds, a family of chemicals that are formed that are formed, are called trial methanes. They are not good for us at all. And there's the tendency now, the cities are moving away from chlorine to chloramines as an additive. Chloramines are a combination of chlorine and ammonia; harder to remove and really worse for us.
CAROLYN: Oh boy.
JOANN: Wow.
RICHARD: So, and then there's the, you know, then there's the topic of fluoride. That's a whole other topic that I used to not talk about because there was such a strong belief in people.
CAROLYN: Yeah, controversy.
RICHARD: Yeah. And then there's a wall and people aren't going to listen. So that, but that's changed. Most people realize that we don't want fluoride. And when they're educated that the fluoride in toothpaste is not the same form as what's typically added to our water.
CAROLYN: Yeah. And I think that's the important point
JOANN: That is important.
CAROLYN: The fluoride is different in toothpaste than the fluoride that they're adding to our water.
RICHARD: Correct. So the fluoride in toothpaste…
CAROLYN: It’s supposedly for our dental health.
RICHARD: That's right. But there's two things. When you put fluoride in toothpaste, or if you have a fluoride treatment, you're spitting it out.
JOANN: Right.
RICHARD: And that's calcium fluoride. So 90% of the fluoride added to the water supply in this country is a waste product from the aluminum fertilizer industry called flora cila cyclic acid. We don't want it.
CAROLYN: We don’t want that.
RICHARD: And when you drink it, it's not going in our mouth and affecting our teeth. It goes to every cell of our body. And there's all kinds of major universities now that are saying no, no, no to fluoride.
CAROLYN: Very interesting. And you have to wonder, are these contaminants causing many of our illnesses today?
JOANN: Absolutely.
CAROLYN: I mean, JoAnn and I see clients, all of our nutritionists, well everybody in the healthcare world is seeing many, many more diseases, you know, in people. So what's causing all of this?
JOANN: Right.
RICHARD: Well, we live in a relatively polluted environment in general. And water is a major part of it.
JOANN: Yeah, yeah, that's right. Yes.
RICHARD: Yup.
JOANN: That’s right. So many of our listeners drink water from private wells. And I think a lot of people have kind of a false sense of security with those private wells.
RICHARD: Right; yes. Because the, yes, because they think, “All the people living in the city and there and there,” but the city tests for about a hundred. Private wells are under regulation to be tested for three things: E-coli bacteria, nitrates, and now arsenic. And arsenic is so not good for us. It's not measured in parts per million like nitrates are. It's measured in parts per billion. So some will call and say, you know, “We're over the legal limit of 10 parts per billion of arsenic. We had our water tested. Can you get us in the, in the safe range? Can you get us in the legal range?” You don't want it at all. The legal business is, you know, yeah. I got to be somewhat careful what I say, but…
JOANN: Wow.
RICHARD: You know, it's a guideline.
JOANN: Yeah.
CAROLYN: It's a guideline and I think that's really important to take hear. And that you did say earlier too, all of these different levels of, or different types of water systems or where they're getting their water from and all of our wells basically are in the same aquifer, right?
RICHARD: That’s correct; yup.
CAROLYN: So what difference does it make if we're a hundred miles from a big city and don't have any industry.
RICHARD: But people that live on wells think, “At least we don't have to deal with chlorine or chloramines; or at least we don't have to deal with fluoride,” because the city adds those. And private well owners don't have that as a variable, but they have other variables.
CAROLYN: They have other variables.
RICHARD: Including if there's bacteria in the well, the only time that that gets tested is when a house is built with a new well or a new well is dug or if a house changes ownership. Otherwise nobody's testing for E-Coli bacteria.
JOANN: That's interesting.
RICHARD: Right? So that's becoming more of a topic. We're doing more disinfection through ultraviolet on private wells. And wells can have iron and black manganese and smell and other things that people think. But either way, we're doing mutual business in both all three of these types of water supplies. They're just a little different.
CAROLYN: So we, we talked a little bit about filtration systems on the market. Maybe you could help us understand, you know, we talked a little bit already about the refrigerator-type one. What about the pitcher-type ones? The Britta or Zero or Pur or you know, all of, all of those pitchers systems, I'm assuming most of them are very similar.
RICHARD: Well, the one that's different is the Zero water.
CAROLYN: The Zero. Okay.
RICHARD: So let's use the two of you as an example. So Zero water will purify water. That filter is, it's using… part of the media there is it's an anion cadmium media that, that that attracts both negative and positively charged ions. So it's going to remove dissolved solids. But if you live in Eden Prairie, it's going to last a lot longer because let's say just for easy calculation, your level of dissolved solids is a hundred parts per million, or you go now to Robbinsdale where it's 550 parts per million, the person in Robbinsdale is going to be happened to replace that constant cause it has to take more out. Does that make sense?
CAROLYN: Yup; yeah.
JOANN: So then that person would have to replace the filter…
RICHARD: It could be more than every week. Oh no, no, no. Depends on how many people, right?
CAROLYN: Yeah.
RICHARD: As a family, how much water is used if they cook with it? So the other thing I find with people is they, they may filter or do something to their drinking water, but then they cook with tap water.
CAROLYN: Cook with tap water. Yeah.
JOANN: Yeah.
RICHARD: And again…
CAROLYN: Hopefully many of our clients won't be doing that.
RICHARD: Correct.
CAROLYN: Well, that's all we have time for today. So Richard, before we close, could you tell our listeners how they can get in touch with you?
RICHARD: I'm absolutely happy to do that. They could email me at richard@richardswater.com. Richard@richardswater.com. I've simplified the name, or they could call me direct at (952) 240-0470 and they could call my office directly at (952) 920-1200.
CAROLYN: Well great. Thank you very much for being with us today, Richard.
JOANN: Yes, thank you. Yeah.
RICHARD: And I'll just, I'll just add that we are a full service company. We do everything from installing to installation service, all of it.
