Living in Greece

Bottled water IS tap water…so why are we wasting money and polluting the environment?

July 30, 2007 at 07:46 ·

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We haven’t bought bottled water for some time now with a couple of exceptions. I know in Germany no one drinks tap water, what about Greece. Is the municipal water supply safe?

I use a cheap water filter system here in Athens and it’s fine (as far as I know). I buy bottled water and refill from my tap. When the bottles get a bit messed up, I buy “proper” water but I recycle the old ones. Works fine for me…

In Germany a lot of people drink tap water. But a lot of people buy bottled water with bubbles in it, so called “mineral water” – same for Switzerland and Austria. Also in those countries bottles are mostly recycled.

Here in Athens I drink only tap water at home, it’s good enough. I sometimes buy 1/2 liter bottles of water at kiosks, when I’m in situations where filling up would be complicated. I’m reusing those so I can have my tap water cooled in convenient portions at home. But of course in the end they get thrown away (nowadays into the blue recycling waste containers).

At the office the tap water is not potable, we’ve got big jugs of water for a water cooler system. At least the jugs are reused.

There are islands in Greece where the tap water quality is just not good enough. It’s hard to solve that on a personal level.

Conclusion: In Greece the “municipal water supply” is of wildly varying quality, it might go from excellent quality to undrinkable bad taste from one village to the next. Athens tap water in in general considered to be potable, albeigh some people claim a chlorine taste.

Actually, the tap water in Germany is perfectly safe to drink and often of better quality than the bottled water, either still or with bubbles, but as betabug mentiones, sales of bottled water are huge here. I stick to tap water myself and it suits me fine. I’ve yet to see a water fountain in Germany, unfortunately.

I’m also all for carrying a reusable plastic bottle, but there are issues about refilling it many times if you don’t have a chance to really get it clean between refills. Every time you take a sip, you’re introducing bacteria into the water and that can get pretty yucky after a while.

Betabug is correct. Based on my experience, water quality varies widely depending on where you are. In some places, you can see and smell that it’s not good; this is why I brought over my filtering system. In some places, such as where I am now, it’s quite fine and the filtering is really optional.

My reusable bottle is a pop-top that screws off at the mouth so I can wash it (in the USA, you usually get one with your water). My mouth doesn’t even need to touch the top because I can squirt the water or sport drink right into my mouth. I’ve used the same one for 5 years. My fiance trains every other day and has used the same bottles for more than a year without trouble or disease. He only rotates out when one of them gets a hole.

When I traveled throughout Europe many years ago, I found places to refill. There were water fountains in the train stations in Germany, but I realize they may not be there any longer. Things change in many countries.

I’m glad to hear everyone is doing their part! 🙂

Hey Kat!
Here in Halkidiki the tap water is considered less than safe…I found out after drinking it for a week. I am still standing, not sick. The water did taste a little funny but again, I am fine. MIL serves only bottled water and just yesterday I asked her if there were recycling programs set up and she said yes, but you have to take the bottles there yourself. She’s not interested in carrying bottles through the village so I offered. Now we need to get her to save them from the trash so that I can do it. The timing of your post is incredible. Great article!!

Doesn’t this situation make you laugh… that people pay for bottled tap-water more than people spend on Gasoline??

I just think… people keep blaming cars and gas as the number one reason we have global warming… but there are no commissions on regulating and not allowing tap water to be bottled.

Comment 1:
Hello there, I understand that this post is not very recent, but I just stumbled upon it and felt a great urge to add my two cents.

I recently moved from Berlin to Athens and must say that I just can’t get along with the high levels of chlorine (and its highly carcinogenic disinfection by-products) in local tap water!

Before, I used to drink tap water all the time, now I find myself forced (by my ‘tastes’ and a lack of a filtering system at the dorm) to buy (and subsequently recycle) plastic bottles filled with mineral water.
It’s inconvenient and I don’t like it, but there is a huge difference between bottled water and tap water.

Even if it isn’t from a mineral spring, as the two (rather exeptional) examples you’ve mentioned in the beginning – at least they’re purified & chlorine free.
Greetings!

Comment 2:
Thank you for the tip, I’m going to lobby my landlords to buy one, in that case. Have a nice day!

Kat Reply:
December 7th, 2012 at 08:39

Answer 1:
In some areas of Greece, the tap water is quite OK. In others, definitely not. It also depends on the day and who is in charge.

As it says in the article, the filtering systems include pitchers with filters, so they’re portable and can be used in a dorm, if you’re interested.

Answer 2:
The landlords aren’t at fault for quality of water and will likely file your request under “funny foreigner” (aka, “pffft, xeni”). Good luck.