Another form of distilling that can come in very useful (although your life likely won’t depend on your ability to do it correctly) is distilling the essences of plants into a liquid. This liquid can be used for flavoring, adding scent, or treating various ailments.

Distilling Water In The Wild

If you are away from home in the wilderness and have an accident that prevents you from walking, you will most likely run out of the water you brought with you before someone finds you. In this instance, you will need a way to distill water that you can drink.

To distill the ground water from the earth, you will need something to dig with, a small container such as a cup, and a piece of flexible plastic.

Start by finding a nearby location with relatively soft earth, somewhere that the sun will shine at least part of the day. Dig a hole in the ground until you reach moist earth. Make sure that the sides of the hole are far enough away from the center that crumbling dirt on the walls of the hole will not fall into your container for holding water. Place your container in the center of the hole. Cover the hole with your piece of flexible plastic, and weight the edges with large rocks and dirt to hold it in place. Carefully place a weight in the center of the plastic, over the container, causing the plastic to make a funnel shape.

As the sun heats the earth, the moisture in the soil will evaporate. It will be unable to escape into the air and will instead condense on the underside of the plastic. The droplets of water will run down the funnel shape and fall into the container below.

The larger the size of your hole, the more moisture in the ground, and the longer the sun is shining on that particular area of the ground, the more water you will collect.

Distilling Fresh Water

If you live near a coastline, you may find yourself needing to distill salt water in order to create fresh water that you can drink. This can also be required when tidal surges or floods cause previously fresh water sources to become contaminated with salt. While they will eventually clear themselves out, in the meantime, you can still use them as a water supply by distilling the water.

To distill fresh water from salt water, you will need one large container and one small container that can withstand heat, a heat source such as a fire or stove, and a funnel-shaped piece of metal or plastic that is large enough to completely cover the large container.

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Fill the large container with as much salt water as would fit in the smaller container, and place it above your heat source. Note that you should not use the second container to measure the salt water, as that will cause the second container to be contaminated with salt. Next, place the second container inside the larger container, making sure that the salt water does not reach past the lip of the second container. Cover both containers with the funnel-shaped piece of metal or plastic. If the metal or plastic is lightweight, you can weigh it down with rocks or other heavy objects.

As the salt water is boiled, the water will turn to steam, leaving the salt encrusting the larger container. The steam will condense upon the underside of the funnel and run down to collect in the smaller container. This is why the funnel needs to be weighted down—because otherwise the force of the boiling steam will lift it up and allow the steam to escape.

When the water is finished boiling, remove the container from the heat source. Allow it to cool, then take off the cover and remove the smaller container from inside the larger container. The smaller container will now be filled with fresh water.

Distilling Essential Oils

The main difference between distilling water and distilling an essential oil from a plant is that when distilling essential oils, the condensed liquid is a mix of oil and water that needs to be separated.

You can create your own distillation mechanism for distilling essential oils, or you can purchase one. For the occasional distiller, it is sufficient to cobble together a temporary still. If you intend to distill a large number of essential oils, you will want the reliability of a professionally constructed still, made out of glass or stainless steel.

The bottom portion of the still is filled with water. The plant material is placed on a mesh screen or other pierced surface that will suspend the plant material above the water and allow steam to pass through it, without dropping the plant material into the water. (Extremely delicate plant matter such as bark shavings or flower petals can float in the water). Above the plant material is a condenser, often angled or curved to prevent the condensed steam from dripping back down onto the plant material. Finally, the separated separates the water from the oil.

The plant material you use should be from whole, fresh plants rather than dried or powdered plants. Avoid plants that have been treated with pesticides or other contaminants, since those will get into the essential oil. Depending on the type of plant you are distilling, you may need the fruit, the flower, the leaves, the roots, or the entire plant. You may get better results from harvesting the plant material at different times of the plant’s life cycle, in different seasons, or at different times of the day. Be very careful as you handle your plants: most essential oils are held in the fine veins and hairs of leaves, which can be easily damaged by over-handling.

If you want to maximize your oil yield for the distillation process, dry your plant material in a shady spot so that you can fit more plant material into the distilling mechanism. (Although you should not dry delicate plant matter such as flower petals.) If you want to maximize the oil yield per plant, use fresh plants. Fewer plants will fit into the distilling mechanism, but each one will yield more oil.

Fill the bottom portion of the distillation mechanism with pure, distilled water for best results. The more particles in the water (the harder the water), the less effective the distillation will be.

When filling the still with plant material, you should try to keep the plant material from touching the walls of the still. You can make the layer of plant material as thick as you desire, so long as it does not touch the walls.

Seal the still, and apply heat to boil the water. Almost all essential essences are released at water’s boiling point, so you should keep the water boiling gently. If the water level gets low, but you are still getting oil out of the condenser, add more water a little at a time, so that it does not stop boiling.

Transfer the collected oil into a clean container made of dark glass or stainless steel, and seal it. The oil should last at least two years, although the potency will gradually fade over time.

If you are making multiple batches of the same essential oil, you can pour the used water back into the still for the next batch. Otherwise, you can either keep the used water (called a hydrosol) if it is useful on its own (such as violet water or rose water), or you can discard it.

©2013 Off the Grid News

Natural Limitations Of The Water Supply

Some of the present problems with our water supply are composition based: with only so much freshwater available, we have a limited base supply of water to work with. Should portions of that freshwater supply suffer from any natural disasters or mal-interference, entire countries and populations would suffer from severe and potentially fatal water shortages.

Approximately 75 percent of available freshwater exists in the form of polar ice caps, meaning the general public cannot access it. In some areas, there already exists substantial conflict over access to water, and not just in countries that fight wars over limited water resources, like Egypt and neighboring countries. Nevada, a sparse climate with limited water resources, routinely fights over the direction of water pipelines, attempting to increase their access to water resources. The more our population grows, the direr the situation grows.

Natural Gas Drilling

As natural gas drilling increases, the amount of life-threatening toxins in our water increases as well. Hydraulic fracturing (fracking) is a method to retrieve natural gas that pumps dangerous chemicals into our water supplies. Recent reports show that nobody seems to know what chemicals are used in the process, despite the fact that gasses and chemicals are being released into our groundwater. EPA officials admit that they are not privy to the chemical compounds that companies are using in this process. The government has openly admitted that they declared a process safe in 2004 without having any idea which chemicals were being used and which chemicals we are being exposed to. Even the initial EPA report that declared the process safe noted that fracking “can cause kidney, liver, heart, blood, and brain damage through prolonged or repeated exposure.” We should be holding the government agency responsible for safe water and air for our children to a higher standard: writing a process off as potentially life threatening while approving it for continued use is unacceptable.

Pollution

Huge corporations throughout America operate with less-than-stellar business practices: that is no surprise to anyone. Anyone who has seen Erin Brockovich has a pretty solid idea of the problem occurring throughout the United States. Every company that drills into the ground presents a threat to sustaining a clean water supply throughout the country, and then they compound the threat they create by dumping chemical waste and other garbage into our water supply. Even companies that bury their waste in the ground have the potential to contaminate our water supplies, as that waste can seep into underground water resources that flow into our rivers and lakes.

Our water transportation infrastructure is not the only outdated system in the U.S., however. Sewage systems also leak every day. While water leakages simply decrease the amount of available water, sewer leaks poison and contaminate much of the water that is available.  The Clean Water Act should have fixed this problem, but over 40 percent of our rivers and lakes still are not safe to swim or fish in. If we cannot even swim in these bodies of water, do we want to ingest them?

It would be almost impossible to pinpoint the origin of every toxin that our water supply has been exposed to, and that should be scary enough in and of itself. What we can do is push companies to transition to safer disposal processes of chemical (and ordinary) waste. Those companies can no longer be allowed to put the lives of millions of people at risk every single day in order to utilize a more convenient and potentially cheaper disposal method.

Outdated Infrastructure

Water shortage problems are inevitable in many communities, simply because of geographical proximity to water supplies. How much are these natural water shortages worsened by inefficient water infrastructure, leaking water each day? Reports show that water infrastructure in the United States currently leaks seven billion gallons of water every day. In a country with limited water resources, we cannot afford to exacerbate the water crisis by using infrastructure so outdated that it would cost more than $300 billion to fix. The water supplies we do have would go much farther if we properly utilized every gallon available to us. While it will be initially expensive, the country as a whole would save billions of dollars every year afterwards if we got all of the water possible out of our natural supplies, rather than being forced to scrounge for water as we lose tons of it each day.

Moving Forward

What is most troubling is that it is almost impossible to know when your water supply is going to be affected by one of the risk factors above. Water leakages happen everywhere, driving up the cost of water and making it less available. We have no way of knowing when contaminated water will enter our homes, putting ourselves and our families at risk.

Moving forward, communities have to push for outdated water infrastructure to be replaced. The government will not wake up one morning and decide to replace a system that will cost billions of dollars: they will have to be persuaded. Building a consensus in our communities that we will no longer allow our water to be wasted and contaminated is one of the most crucial steps we can take.

Make sure that your family is using a top-notch filtration system and purifying all of the water you use to avoid any interaction with dangerous chemicals that can be found in water throughout the country. There is a lot more at risk than water that tastes poorly: the health of your family is at risk.

©2012 Off the Grid News

One of the most vulnerable portions of our system is our water infrastructure. Largely stationary and unguarded, a wealth of opportunities exists for those looking to damage the system. Groups could easily dump toxins or viruses into the water or cut off access to certain amounts of the supply. The water infrastructure system in the U.S. has three branches: the water supply, the facilities we use to treat and filter water, and the distribution system. Each one of these branches is vulnerable to infiltration. Terrorist organizations have carried out attacks on water portals for the last ten years in an attempt to prove that no portion of the water system is safe from infiltration or attack. Unlike like shootings or bombings, which have relatively localized impacts on the communities in which they are released, attacks on the water system can affect an entire state, depending on the outlay of the water supply.

Distribution System

The distribution system is the most vulnerable of the three areas of our water infrastructure, and any attack on the distribution system can cause the most potential damage. Any attack on a portal (say, releasing a toxin into a fire hydrant) can carry that toxin far past the point of entry, infiltrating other water supplies as well. Most of the successful attacks on the water system have occurred at the distribution level.

Water officials throughout the country have carried out tests to test the vulnerability of our water system. These tests proved that in only a few minutes, a motivated terrorist group or individual could slip toxins into our water supply via a water hydrant or unsecured manhole. The most disturbing aspect of a potential attack on our water supply is that it takes dangerously little amounts of contaminants to affect the water supply for millions of individuals. We could, on any given day, be the victims of a vicious attack on the water cycle that was carried out using no more than leftover rat poison slipped into a local fire hydrant. Once water has passed through the filtration system, any attack on the water infrastructure is difficult to catch and treat. These types of attacks may even be unnoticeable until several deaths occur in a community. Even then, it would be difficult for water officials to trace the source of the attack, or remove the toxins from the water supply without running the entire water supply back through the filtration plant.

One of the goals of a terrorist attack on the water system may not even be to cause much damage to the system; rather, they may be hoping to disrupt public trust in the system. If a terrorist organization launched an attack on the water system and released a fatal toxin into the water distribution system in a few cities across the country, the ensuing panic could be enough to shut down entire public use of the water system. Already facing a water shortage, what would happen? Nobody would feel safe using water from their local reservoirs or rivers, and the amount of bottled water that would have to be imported to meet our water needs would rise dramatically, ballooning the cost of living for every family across the United States.

Moving Forward

Most of the water infrastructure that we use today was built forty or fifty years ago, when threats of bioterrorism or attacks on our water supply were unlikely. Because officials did not anticipate these threats at the time the infrastructure was built and our government has not taken the initiative to update these systems, almost nothing in the system is protected against bioterror attacks.

When government officials have made attempts to increase the security of the water system, those efforts have primarily been directed at retrofitting large water facilities with security systems. While that certainly does close off one avenue of opportunity for potential attackers, there is a much more efficient way to eliminate likely attacks. Because terrorists will look for a small access point with maximum potential damage, the most crucial thing that we can do to protect our water supply is simply procuring the necessary funding to secure manholes, water tanks, and fire hydrants. This would substantially decrease the likelihood of an attack. Following these efforts, carefully evaluating each portion of the system is necessary to close the current security gaps. Water filtration and distribution systems should receive massive security overhauls in attempts to close the most likely vantage points.

Some experts posit the ideas that residential units can use specialized filtration or distillation systems to filter many of the pathogens that would likely be chosen by terrorist groups in an attack on the water. Increasing chlorine in the water could work against some diseases (cholera or smallpox come to mind), but that would be largely useless against a weaponized form of anthrax distributed throughout the water. In addition to water filtration systems, water testing systems are available; the idea being that each family will have the capability to detect a contaminate in the water before consumption and will be able to alert authorities and switch water supplies. While these home systems should be able to filter out some contaminants based on particle size, government officials do warn families that none of these companies can guarantee that a home water filtration system will protect you from a terrorist’s biological organism of choice.

We will never be able to protect ourselves from every threat against the water supply—or even every threat to the general populace—and that should not be our focus. What we can do, however, is put an end to some of the alarming opportunities that terrorist organizations do have to poison or murder millions of Americans. And if your community is not willing or able to take these steps, then perhaps it is time to pursue off-the-grid water options such as a well or rainwater collection.

©2012 Off the Grid News

Beginning With Water Conservation

You can begin by only running your dishwasher or washer with full loads rather than running it for smaller loads. This helps decrease the amount of water used in the home by as much as 1,000 gallons each month. There are some homes where this just doesn’t seem to do the job, and that is where recycling gray water can come into play.

Many people often wonder what gray water is exactly, and simply put, it’s all that water that drains out from your washing machine, showers, bathtubs, and more. It’s easy to treat it and made to be reusable in your home for a few different things. There are a number of countries that are already using this method, but for a majority of the U.S., this process isn’t heard of. Water is used and then simply discarded. However, one of the best places to start to help the drought in your area is to consider using gray water, and luckily, it is becoming a more and more common thing.

How to Use Gray Water

Gray water usage can be a great idea, and once you get past the fact that you are recycling your washer water, it can help cut back on the amount of water a home uses. There are a few drawbacks, however. While this water might be better for you than the water that comes from your toilets, gray water still is technically sewage. Water that comes from your washer might contain detergent or bleach in some cases, and any bath water might contain urine or fecal matter if you have little ones in the home.

Gray water usage can be used for watering and irrigation. Plants are going to love this gray water. Plants don’t always need fresh water, and, in fact, there are some particles and things in gray water that can have a positive effect on your plants.

Collecting Gray Water

Now that you know about gray water, you might be wondering how you can get started using it around the home. To start with, you can begin using gray water right away. For example, the water that you give your pets can be used to water your plants before giving them a fresh bowl of water.

Also, the water that comes from your AC unit outside can be collected and reused. This water isn’t necessarily good to drink, but it can be used for irrigation purposes. You can buy a kit from the store or you can take a bucket from home and place it under the end of the drain pipe, where the water is coming out. This water can be used to water your plants, and because the most water is produced in the summer, it’s beneficial to use this water in the summer months when dry conditions are more prevalent.

You can catch the water as it drains from your washer as well. You’re going to need to have a few buckets and quick reflexes though to catch the water once it starts coming out.

You’ll also find that there are a number of gray water collection kits that can help separate the gray water from the black water that would come from your toilets. You should look for a kit that has an emergency shut off valve in case something starts going wrong as well as a way to route your water to the sewer in case you don’t need the gray water at the moment.

Using gray water to water your trees and shrubs can prove to be beneficial in a number of ways. A few things to keep in mind include:

• Avoid using gray water on newly planted plants
• Avoid using gray water on indoor plants
• Apply the gray water directly to the plant’s soil
• Avoid applying gray water to leaves or stems
• Avoid using gray water on edible plants

Can You Use Gray Water in Your Garden?

You can use gray water in your garden as long as you follow a few steps to ensure the water is safe from harsh chemicals or things that would harm your plants. You should only gather as much water as your plants and flowers are going to need. You don’t want to overwater them with gray water, and anything excess should go into your sewer.

One thing to help you determine how much you need is that a square foot of garden can handle about a half gallon of gray water a week. So for example, a garden that measures 500 square feet can handle about 250 gallons a week of gray water.

If you have the ability to choose the gray water used, consider gray water from your shower or bathtub. Using water from your kitchen sink or dishwasher should be the last place you get water from since food is cleaned and there might be grease or food debris in the water.

Gray water serves a number of uses around the home, and while you can’t drink it, it can serve other purposes to help cut back on the amount of water you use.

©2012 Off the Grid News

In 1974, the federal government passed the Safe Drinking Water Act, which is designed to regulate the amount of dangerous, disease-causing chemicals that are allowed in the nation’s water supply. One would hope that no such chemical contamination would be present legally, but of course everyone understands there are practical considerations that make it virtually impossible to filter everything out of the water. Nevertheless, if there were one government law or regulation that most would probably approve of, it would likely be the Safe Drinking Water Act, which guarantees that every American citizen who opens a tap in their home will be rewarded with a crystal clear stream of safe, refreshing water that can be consumed without concern.

Or at least this is what the Safe Drinking Water Act is supposed to guarantee. But as is almost always the case when the government gets involved, the reality does not come close to matching either the promises or the rhetoric.

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The Truth about the Safe Drinking Water Act

While the intentions of those who first proposed a law to protect Americans from the toxics contamination of their water supply may have been honorable, the unfortunate fact is that corporations, large industrial concerns, and other powerful actors always use their influence to make sure that any legislation passed at the state, local, or federal levels will not chip away at their power or erode their profit margins in any meaningful way. Government interference may cause problems for ordinary citizens and small businesses, but it seldom if ever inconveniences the truly powerful. Thanks largely to the behind-the-scenes lobbying efforts of manufacturers, oil companies, the chemical industry, and other assorted interest groups that profit from the “better living through chemistry” mentality, the Safe Drinking Water Act as it actually exists is little more than a hollow shell that does more harm than good by tricking people into thinking they are being provided with clean, safe water, when in fact just the opposite is the case.

At the present time, there are at least 60,000 chemicals in use in the United States in homes and industries, and hundreds of these have been shown through independent testing to cause illnesses of various types including cancer. But incredibly, less than 100 of these chemicals are actually monitored or controlled under the auspices of the Safe Drinking Water Act, and even though the use of chemicals is accelerating, no new additions have been made to the Act’s list of regulated substances since 2000. And it is important to note that even the toxins that are covered by the Act are not forbidden completely – they are allowed in drinking water just as long as their levels don’t rise above certain concentrations. This would be fine if these allowable amounts had been proven to be harmless, but in fact the latest scientific research has shown that many toxic chemicals can cause health problems at much lower levels than had previously been believed. In fact, it is becoming more and more clear that there probably is no such thing as a safe dosage of a toxic chemical, and when different chemicals are mixed together in the cells of biological organisms, the results of this diabolical alchemy are completely unpredictable.

On those occasions when individual EPA officials have tried to have the Safe Drinking Water Act’s regulatory list expanded, or to have its standards updated based on the latest research findings, as a reward these people have been attacked, threatened with reprisal, or driven out of government service completely. Industry and the elected officials they control are simply too powerful, and they have never been willing to permit effective regulation of chemical pollution by any government agency.

Drinking Water Contamination: A Breakdown

According to an analysis of the available data performed by a non-profit group called the Environmental Working Group, since 2004 over 62 million Americans have been exposed to drinking water that violates existing government health guidelines. Most of these chemicals are not actually monitored or regulated by the Safe Drinking Water Act, but among those that are, forty-nine of them have been found at levels that violate the existing legal standards of the Act. But those substances not regulated by the provisions of the Act are not prohibited or controlled in any way, leaving industries or individuals free to dump them into our lakes, ponds, rivers, and groundwater with impunity if they so desire.

Some of the pernicious substances that have been found in water supply systems across the United States include:

• Arsenic (declared safe for drinking water by the government at twice the levels recommended by private scientists)
• Uranium
• Mercury
• Lead
• Manganese
• Perchlorate – a rocket fuel additive
• Trichloroethylene – a degreaser used in manufacturing
• Perchloroethylene – a dry cleaning solvent

The last three chemicals on this list have become quite ubiquitous, and yet none are currently regulated by the Safe Drinking Water Act, even though all three appear to increase cancer risk. But trying to get anything new added to the Act since its original passage has been like trying to fit the proverbial camel through the eye of a needle, and that has turned this piece of legislation into little more than window dressing disguised as meaningful consumer protection.

According to the most recent findings, the ten largest water supply systems in the United States, which provide drinking water to over 28 million Americans, are contaminated with an average of 23 chemicals per system. While it is true that the majority of these chemicals are found at levels declared acceptable by the government, as we have already seen these standards should be taken with a grain of salt. And of course these standards were set based on the assumption that a person would only be exposed to one particular chemical at a time; when twenty-three different chemicals are mixed together in one big toxic stew, no one really has any idea what kind of damage this might do if consumed and absorbed by the human organism.

Keep in mind that the real causes of disease or infirmity are extremely difficult to pin down in most instances, as the processes behind the development of illness or dysfunction inside the human body are quite complex and still somewhat mysterious. Even when the cause of a disease is an identifiable viral or bacterial agent, it is possible that an immune system weakened by exposure to toxic chemicals could ultimately be to blame. The bottom line is that exposure to this mixture of potentially dangerous substances, even when they are contaminating the water supply in very small amounts, could be implicated in all kinds of health disorders without us even knowing what is going on.

Decontaminate Your Mind

Many would probably argue that the best way to solve the problem is to strengthen the Safe Drinking Water Act, or to replace it with something new. But as Albert Einstein famously pointed out, doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results is the definition of insanity. When it comes to water safety, the interests allied against consumer protection are just too strong, and the passage of a new law or the adoption of a changed version of the old one would in the end prove to be pointless. Such a legislative act would no doubt be so filled with so many exclusions and loopholes and unenforceable standards that it would only give people a false sense of security, while giving polluters a new and improved PR cover behind which they could hide their destructive activities.

Rather than relying on the government to protect us, a much more sensible answer is for citizens to become more informed about the things that affect their lives. By law, all water systems in all municipalities must be tested for toxins, and it is up to the citizens in each location to make sure they know what is in their water and to make sure that their neighbors know what is in the water as well. Publicity combined with demands for cleaner, safer water on the part a united citizenry would have a much better chance of making a positive impact than another empty government law that is all talk and no action.

The only thing to watch out for would be the inevitable public relations campaigns from polluting industries and other contaminators that would try to convince everyone that the poisons in the water were really not all that bad. When it comes to chemical contamination of the water supply, it should be assumed that any and all contamination is dangerous and unacceptable, and that anyone who tries to say differently cannot be trusted. People need to unite and try to place as much collective pressure as they can on the operators of local water systems, local government officials, and whoever else will listen as they push for cleaner drinking water. Government has shown it cannot be trusted to protect our most critical resources, which is why we must all take responsibility and begin looking out for our own interests – forcefully, loudly, and with unshakeable determination.

©2012 Off the Grid News

Flavoring your water is an easy answer, but you didn’t store good, clean water for weeks or months just to fill it with harmful chemicals or fake ingredients. Fortunately, quality, all-natural water flavorings are out there. Many of them also come with health benefits, letting you get more out of every glass.

Lemon

Putting a slice of lemon into a glass of water isn’t just a restaurant trick. This habit also offers your body key nutrients and disease fighting benefits.

Lemon was trusted by the Romans as a cure for all poisons, but the key to that benefit was lemon’s power as a liver and cardiovascular health booster. Lemon juice stimulates liver function, while the potassium in lemon strengthens veins and fights high blood pressure. Thus, while lemon may not “cure” poisons, it will help your body flush them out.

The citric acid and vitamin C in lemons also work to boost your immunity. Drinking lemon water means helping your body fight off colds, flu, and fever. Scurvy won’t be a problem for you anymore, either – lemons fight it off!

To get the optimal benefits, squeeze half a lemon into eight ounces of water and drink it at room temperature. Alternatively, slice up two lemons and let them infuse overnight in a pitcher of water. If you don’t have any lemon, try using limes, oranges, and grapefruit—they can all offer similar benefits.

Vanilla Extract

You may only think of vanilla extract when you are baking, but it can also help you healthfully flavor water. A few drops in an eight-ounce glass provide flavor and a fast home remedy for multiple ailments.

Vanilla extract can be used to cure upset stomach or emotional distress. Vanilla is useful for soothing nausea, while multiple studies have shown it can also counteract anxiety and stress. In an emergency situation where you’re drinking your stored water and everyone is a bit edgy, adding a bit of vanilla extract is a fast, easy way to restore peace of mind.

To get the maximum benefit, add a few drops to water at room temperature and sip it. The extract will go to work internally to soothe your stomach, while the smell of the vanilla will go to work on your mind to calm and soothe your spirit.

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Cucumber

Putting cucumber slices in water is an old afternoon tea trick, but it turns out there was a reason behind doing it. Cucumber has a natural temperature a few degrees below the ambient temperature, helping it cool down whatever beverage (and whatever drinker) happens to be around it. It’s something to keep in mind if your off-the-grid lifestyle doesn’t come with an icemaker!

Your cucumber slices will also give you anti-inflammatory and cancer-fighting benefits. Cucumbers contain three lignans (lacriciresinol, pinoresinol, and secoisolariciresinol), which have been proven to fight breast, uterine, and ovarian cancers. Fresh cucumber extracts, meanwhile, inhibit the behavior of pro-inflammatory enzymes like COX-2. The juice is also rich in anti-oxidants.

To infuse water with cucumber, slice a ripe cucumber thinly and let it set in the water for at least an hour to spread the flavor (longer is better). Peeling the cucumber before you slice it will give a sweeter flavor to the water and also protect you against any toxins or wax on the skin of cucumbers not from your own garden.

Mint

Last but not least, you can always add mint to your water. This common and enthusiastic grower can be found in most climates and brings a familiar, fresh taste to water. Though it may be tempting to dismiss mint as nothing more than a garnish, it can offer you important health benefits.

Mint water brings nutrition and digestive health. Drinking mint-flavored water is a long-standing home remedy for digestive problems, but modern research has confirmed that this natural diuretic can help stop colitis and irritable bowel syndrome. It is rich in vitamins A, C, and B12 with traces of iron, potassium, selenium, and zinc.

To get the flavor going in your water, add fresh mint leaves and then crush them. This crushing spreads the mint oil from the leaves so you can drink the water right away, or you can let it set for a few hours for a stronger flavor. Oh, and of course drinking mint water will leave you with minty-fresh breath as a bonus!

©2012 Off the Grid News

But digging a traditional well is not the only option. There is another type of well that is perfectly capable of providing sufficient supplies of fresh, clean, potable water to meet the needs of most households, especially if at least a degree of water conservation is practiced. Driven-point wells are a convenient and affordable alternative, and in most instances they can be installed without the use of expensive or complicated equipment, which can make them an amazing project for the hands-on type who prefers the do-it-yourself approach.

Even though driven-point techniques have been in use for a long time, many are still not familiar with all the particulars of this kind of well. This is a pity, because driven-point wells can be the perfect answer for those who are determined to take every step possible to become self-sufficient and independent in all aspects of their lives.

Installing a Driven-Point Well: The Basics

Driven-point wells are constructed from narrow steel pipes that are pounded straight down into the ground until they go deep enough to pass through the water table. The process starts with a two to three foot long piece of pipe with a sharp, screened well-point tip on the end that facilitates easy movement through the earth. In most cases a hole will be augured out to make pounding this initial length of pipe in easier, and water may be poured into the hole to make the earth even softer. A hand-held post driver can be used in many cases to begin driving the well-point, although when a little more force is needed it may be necessary to use a motorized machine with it tripod and pulley set-up that will lift and drop a heavy driver down on top of the pipe over and over. The most efficient way to pound the well sections into the earth uses a long thin driver that actually goes inside the pipe and hammers down on a metal extension located near the bottom of the well-point. This greatly decreases the force applied to the pipe itself and reduces the chances of it becoming bent or warped by the driving process.

The well-point section contains a reinforced screen that will allow water to enter the pipe while filtering out sand, gravel, and other types of particulates. The top part of the section is threaded, so that when it has been driven far enough into the earth a second section can be inserted and coupled with the original, allowing the driving process can continue, with more sections of pipe being added until water has been reached. The final section of pipe installed should rise about 12 inches above the earth, in order to protect the well entrance from contamination by runoff (although a threaded cap will need to be screwed onto the top as well if the pump and water discharge system will be offset). The simplest way to determine when water has been struck is to continuously pour water into the pipe as it is being driven in to see where it goes. Once water stops leaking from the pipe through the screen and starts backing up, this probably means that water has been found. Theoretically it could also mean that clay or some other kind of insoluble soil has been encountered, but it is usually possible to tell the difference because sandy soil in the area of the water table is soft and allows for easy driving, while dense clay will resist the driving process quite noticeably.

Once water has been found and the driving stopped, the basic structure of the driven-point well will then be in place. Your next step will be to install the pump, water discharge system, and the pressure tank, so you can begin pumping and storing water from your brand new well as soon as possible.

The Essential Survival Secrets of The Most Vigilant… Most Skilled… And Most Savvy Survivalists in the World!

Pumps and Discharge Systems: The Choices

Before choosing a water pump for a driven-point well, it is necessary to know how far below the surface of the earth the water table is on your land. If water can be found at a depth of 20 feet or less, you will need a shallow-well pump. This kind of pump works well with driven-point piping that is relatively narrow, perhaps as little as 1 ¼ inches in diameter. If, on the other hand, the water table is more than 20 feet below the surface, it will be necessary to use a deep-well pump, which is capable of generating enough force to bring water up from a depth of 70 feet or more. In this instance the pipe used to make the drive-point well must be 2 inches in diameter or more, to make room for a jet packer assembly that must be installed inside the pipe to assist the pumping system in its work.

Pump location will determine what kind of water discharge system is required. If the pump is to be placed right over the top of the drive-point pipe set-up, the arrangement will be quite uncomplicated. This is the type of system that feeds the old hand-style pumps that we still see sometimes in parks or at historical sites.  Some kind of tank will likely be used to collect the water, from where it can be piped out, carried out, or used to feed a hose if the water is going to be used for the purposes of watering and irrigation.

But if the pump is to be placed at an offset location – which is by far the most common arrangement for wells driven to supply normal household needs – then a more complex set up will need to be installed.  The driven-pipe system will need to have a connector called a pitless adapter installed between two of its steel pipe sections. This device makes it possible to connect a water discharge pipe with the well pipe by coming in from the side, at a T-shaped angle, without having to dig a pit down around the driven-point well site. Water can then be diverted perpendicularly from the well to be collected at an offset site, which in most cases will be either directly adjacent to or inside the house. It is illegal to install a driven-point well in the basement, and since this is where most people want their water to be collected offset wells are a necessity for most. The one unbreakable rule with a pitless adapter is that it must be installed far enough below the earth that the pipes of the well are protected from freezing during even the coldest months of winter.

With an offset system, the pressurized water discharge pipe will leave the well at a 90-degree angle and continue in a straight line until it reaches the location of the pump and tank storage site. If the elevations of both sites are equal this is a relatively uncomplicated affair, and the discharge pipe can continue right straight in to the pump and pressure tank. However, if the discharge pipe comes in below the basement or pump house, an elbow will be used to connect another discharge pipe to the end of the original, so that water can be pulled up to vertically by the pumping system.

Location, Location, Location

Driven-point wells require a permeable and relatively sandy sub-surface, otherwise there will be no way to install them without damaging the pipe. Before commencing, you will need to do some research to make sure you are living in an area with soft enough soil for a driven-point system to be used. But even if it turns out you are living in an area perfectly suited for driven wells, there is much more to selecting a well specific location than just proximity to the house. Both state departments dedicated to natural resource management and county authorities are likely to have codes that must be followed when putting in a driven well, and a lot of their restrictions deal with issues related to well location. You will need to find a spot for your well that has a low probability of becoming contaminated with bacteria, nitrates, or any other kind of toxic or dangerous materials that could be transported by runoff from rainwater or melting snow.

The basic idea is that driven-point wells should be sited at the highest point that is practical on any given parcel of land. The top of the pipe must also rise at least 12 inches above the ground, and when the pump and water discharge pipes are located underground the top must also be covered with a sealed cap or tight concrete seal to make sure no contaminants can fall into the pipe from the sky.

Sources that could possibly contaminate a well via rainwater/snow melt runoff include:

• Sewer pipes and septic holding tanks
• Retention ponds or sludge disposal sites
• Water spouts or other runoff pipes
• Storm sewers
• Animal yards
• Ditches
• Buried fuel tanks
• Landfills
• Graveyards

Each individual state and/or county will have specific regulations about how far your well must be placed from these sources. This is one instance, however, where government regulations are pretty much based on common sense, and in some instances you might want to locate your well even farther away from potential contamination sources than the law requires.

After a well has been installed, codes require that the water pumped up must be tested for bacteria before the well can be officially put into use. This can be done through the state or with a private laboratory, but once your well water has been certified bacteria-free it should be safe for drinking – provided, of course, that no other contaminants are present, which is why locating a driven-point well away from possible sources of toxic runoff is vitally important. As long as your well has been driven down at least 20 feet below the surface, you should be safe from contamination, but if your well has been placed at shallower depths you really should have the water thoroughly tested for any and all possible contaminants before you even think about drinking it. Generally speaking, driven-point wells between 10 feet (the minimum depth in most states) and 20 feet below the surface should probably be reserved for outside uses such as irrigation or cleaning.

After Installation

Once a well has been installed and the pump is up and working, you should test your system out to see how much water it is producing. A minimum capacity of at least four gallons a minute is recommended for household use, but 8-10 gallons a minute is much better if you plan to have a well that can meet all of your water-use needs. A larger pressure tank can be installed to compensate for low-producing wells, and one of the neat things about drive-point wells is that you can actually increase capacity by installing two or more parallel wells that can be coupled together and hooked up as a unit to your pumping system.

Before being put into use, driven-point wells will need to be disinfected with a chlorine solution of about 100 parts per million, and the well will need to be flushed out afterward to make sure all traces of the chlorine have been removed. Collecting your water sample for the bacteriological test is the final step, and once you have gotten your results back and your well has been verified safe you will need to file a final report with the Department of Natural Resources in your state to let them know that you have dotted all of your ‘Is and crossed all of your ‘Ts.

Driving Your Way to Water Independence

Installing a driven-point well on your land may require a permit, so you should check all DNR and county regulations carefully before planning out your well and possibly submitting your application. But once you have formulated a plan that can meet your water needs while taking into account all the unique characteristics of your parcel of land, everything from that point on should be smooth sailing. Driven-point wells are an ideal choice for those who love to take on challenging home improvement projects, and there are plenty of materials available online that can give you the complete rundown on what kind of equipment and materials you will need to install such a well on your own personal homestead. As long as you are diligent in your research and detailed in your planning, putting in a driven-point well should bring an end to your dependence on your local water utility, giving you the water independence  you may someday need in order to make it through the difficult times ahead.

Below is a YouTube video of the driven-well process for garden irrigation:

What Is the Water Rule?

The water rule is do not hold up in a place that is either more than a twenty minute walk or has the potential of being cutoff from a fresh water source.

Adherence to this rule is vital to your survival, as the absence of water can change your situation drastically.  You have to hunker down near a fresh water source that cannot be contaminated, because this will ensure that you can outlast whatever catastrophe occurs.  A water source that does not have these attributes will eventually fail you.

Urban Water Sources

There are not many places in an urban environment that will remain uncontaminated.  You do have to be well aware of diseases and microbes, especially when having to do with your water supply.

• Rivers and Lakes – One of the best places to find water is in a river or lake.  Many big cities in the U.S. and around the world are right off of rivers and lakes.  These sources are almost constantly moving and are never stagnant.  Stagnant water is a microbe magnet, but constantly moving water (especially when it comes from high mountain streams, such as the South Platte River in Denver) is highly oxygenated and will be cleaner than almost every other water source.
• Springs – A spring is a great place to find good clean water.  This water comes up from the ground, as this is where ground water and the surface of the earth meet.  These are not impervious to contamination, but there is less of a chance.  They do lack in one area that we will discuss later.
• Manmade Wells – These can either be a godsend or they can be a hole of death.  Drinking from a contaminated well has the potential of killing you quickly, but a well will almost never dry up unless a drought is very extreme.  These also possess a weakness as compared to a river or lake.
• Urban Water Source – The chance here is 50/50.  You might get lucky and find that the water has not be shut off or contaminated, and yet you might not.  This should be your last resort.  Especially during a disaster, water services are one of the first things to go, and one of the easiest to contaminate.

Where Not to Drink

Here are a few places that you will want to avoid at all costs.  Drinking from here, even if you’ve boiled and purified it, could cost you your life and a painful death.

• Contaminated Urban Water Supply – Urban areas are where people gather together.  Wherever people come together, that is where disease is transmitted most rapidly.  One of the most notorious transmission points is a damaged city water system.  Even if there is water pressure coming through the lines, if no one is there to monitor city water purification, then that water is essentially clean-looking sewage.
• Stagnant Pond or Lake – These areas are chock full of microbes and biologics.  There is nothing worse than contracting a parasite from a stagnant pond, and these will suck the life out of your body.  Also, these stagnant water sources have a knack for being dumping grounds for other undesirable materials.
• A Well Near a Contaminated Area – For instance, say that an area just backed up with sewage, because those facilities are down.  If a well is near those facilities, all of that sewage has seeped into the groundwater, the same groundwater from which you are drinking and bathing.

The Essential Survival Secrets of The Most Vigilant… Most Skilled… And Most Savvy Survivalists in the World!

Hygiene and Water

The availability of water is not only crucial for hydration and cooking, but it is also crucial for hygiene.  One of the major reasons why disease would run rampant in a city when the water shuts off is because people cannot clean themselves effectively.  Regular bathing is crucial to avoid disease, especially the painful skin ones.  Water can easily wash off dirt, grime, and sweat, which are harbors for disease.  Clean washing water is crucial to keeping healthy.

Also, it is vital to designate a water source or storage facility that is at least twenty yards from your designated latrine for obvious reasons.

Source of Life, Source of Food

The most optimal place to find your water is by hunkering down near a fast moving stream, (that has a long history of never going dry) a river, or fresh lake.  Another one of the best reasons for that is because fish is an excellent source of calories, and fishing is something you can do while performing other tasks.  These water sources are excellent for survival and will keep you alive.

If you cannot settle here, then be sure to find a spring or a non-contaminated well.  Simply check the surroundings of the well to be sure that it cannot be contaminated in the future.  If that is not possible in your location, you must move to survive.  Your water stores will only last so long.

Water Wars

Ancient kings used to have a grasp on just how crucial water supply happened to be.  An efficient general would lay siege to a city, but before they made their final approach on the gates, their army would dam up the city’s water source. Without the water, they could not drink, bathe, or even hydrate their livestock, which was their food source.  Pretty soon every man, woman, child, and animal was dropping dead from dehydration.  Within days, the people on the inside would be begging their own king to allow the aggressors within the walls to end the suffering.

If kings understood how vital water was back then, imagine the tactics they can use today.  Find a water source that is not subject to those kinds of tactics.

©2012 Off the Grid News

Included in the latter category is the current situation with the world’s water supply. More than one billion people now lack access to clean drinking water, and this problem is exploding faster than the spread of mass hunger, which usually gets a lot more publicity. But while human beings can sometimes live for weeks without food, without water they will die in a very short period of time, which makes insufficient supplies of drinking water a problem that could potentially wipe out hundreds of millions of people during an emergency much more quickly than any plague or famine.

The concept of peak oil is probably familiar to most by now. The idea is that the earth has reached a point of no return with the supply of oil, and it is inevitable that shortages will occur more and more frequently in the years ahead until the world’s supply of petroleum finally either runs out or becomes so prohibitively expensive to obtain that no one will even bother to try and pump it out of the ground anymore. Obviously inspired by the term “peak oil,” some have begun referring to the situation with the world’s water supply as “the peak water problem.”

To Peak or Not to Peak, That is the Question

In one sense, comparing oil and water is like, well…comparing oil and water. Geological processes slowly turned organic matter into oil over the course of tens of millions of years, and because this activity takes such a long period of time from the perspective of human society, it is clear that oil is a finite resource—in other words, the earth can’t possibly make new oil as fast as we are using it up. Water, on the other hand, is constantly recycled by nature because it is a part of a closed system where nothing can ever be truly gained or lost. With water, the problem is that when it becomes polluted, it is no longer usable, and when too many people live in arid areas where supplies are limited, there are shortages because it is simply too expensive to ship it in or divert it in adequate quantities from somewhere else. To put it more simply, water shortages are relative and conditional, whereas shortages of oil ultimately are irrevocable and absolute.

So unlike oil, water is not really running out. But human beings need plentiful supplies of clean water that is fit to drink and bathe in, and they need it to be located in the places where they are actually living. Also, they need it to be used efficiently, in the least wasteful way possible, so that the supplies that do exist are available when people really need them.

The Balance of Nature

It is of course true that God told His people to be fruitful and multiply. But He didn’t tell them to congregate in overcrowded cities, or to build those cities in arid wastelands. He also didn’t tell them to try and grow foods in areas that were so dry that valuable water would have to be taken out of the ground and dumped on crops because there was no rainfall.

The problem of peak water is not so much a problem of too many people as it is a problem caused by foolish social, cultural, and economic practices that plunder the earth and enrich a few elites at the expense of everyone else. When Jesus threw the money changers out of the Temple and stated that a camel would pass through the eye of a needle before a rich man would get into heaven, he was not so much condemning wealth and success as he was condemning those who used their wealth to try and gain control over other people’s lives.

Lust for power is the real root of evil in modern society. If the world is now facing critical shortages of drinkable water, it is because those who seek the kind of power that should only be reserved to the Lord have been willing to pillage the earth and exploit its resources because they know the consequences of these actions will be visited upon the poor huddled masses and not upon themselves. Putting cities in deserts, wasting millions of tons of water to make things grow where they were never meant to grow, and letting industries use lakes and rivers as their dumping grounds shows a contempt for God’s creation that is appalling, but logical for a society that has embraced a materialistic philosophy of life that allows a few to live in luxury while billions of others struggle just to survive.

Finding The Human Scale

The off-the-grid philosophy emphasizes the importance of freedom and independence. But there is something else that is inherent in this choice of lifestyle, and that is respect. Living successfully off the grid is only possible when there is a recognition of limits and a respect for the wisdom of nature, which is ultimately a reflection of a greater divine reality. Carefully using resources means respecting the fact that they are limited, and when it comes to water this means planting crops that grow naturally in the geographical area where we live, collecting rainwater and purifying it for our own use whenever possible, drilling wells and living where the water in the ground is sufficient to sustain us, and trying to use up as little of this precious resource as we possibly can as we go about our daily activities.

Peak water is the product of a society that believes itself to be so powerful that it can overcome all limits and conquer nature through technology and science. But inevitably, societies that refuse to recognize limits collapse under the weight of their own hubris. In the current situation, the off-the-grid alternative may be the only way we can get back to living in balance and in harmony with nature once again, as God always intended. When society has gone insane, the correct response is to try and live as sanely as you can, in the hopes that maybe you can help plant a seed that may eventually grow into something new and better.

©2011 Off the Grid News

Water Sources and Storage

At one time or another, each of us has taken a sip of water from a water hose or a nearby stream for a temporary pick-me-up. These cool refreshing breaks are not the same as having a significant and safe water source to sustain a family. When living off the grid, it is paramount to have a safe source of water. One of the simplest and plentiful sources of water is rainwater. This source can be collected easily from your own home. Simply using rain gutters directed to water barrels or other collection devices you have chosen can increase your source dramatically. Another source similar to this, for those in any areas with access to it, is snowmelt. As the weather warms after the winter, plentiful snow begins to melt. This can also be collected as a source of water for your family. Again, collect the snowmelt in any water barrel or other collection device. If you have access to a stream, lake, or pond on your property, you may have an even more plentiful source of water. However, you will need to check with your local regulatory agency to determine what, if any, limits there are to the amount of water you can pump and use from that source.

When considering a water storage system, you also have several options. As mentioned above, water can be collected in barrels or other devices. Ensure easy access to the water you have collected by adding a tap to the bottom of the storage container. In addition to these smaller devices, you may need to think of storing larger amounts of water. For this, consider using a cistern to store your water. Of course, if you want an even larger amount, you may consider building your own storage well.

Once you have collected and stored your water, you still have to consider the best way for that water to be used by your family. Of course, if you are using the water as a means to water your plants or clean a load of laundry, you may not be as concerned about the quality. If you are using the water to sustain your family’s drinking supply though, the quality of the water can mean the difference between life and death.

Water Filtration

At its most basic, water filtration is the process of ridding water of any impurities through a physical barrier, chemicals, or a biological process. An easy example of water filtration is boiling water or cleansing impurities with carbon filters. These systems are often small in nature and are sometimes thought to improve the taste of water. The key element to remember in terms of a water filtration system is that they focus largely on impurities. These systems can be used to remove even the tiniest of particles, often including bacteria and microbial cysts. Filtration systems can be permanent or portable, and the size you need will entirely depend upon the amount of water you want to filter. However, it is important to note that water filtration systems do not treat viruses in any way. While these systems may make water appear to be clean, they cannot be relied upon as a sole means to ensure safe drinking water for you or your family.

Water Purification

Similar to water filtration, the process of water purification works to remove impurities from water. However, the impurities focused on in the purification process are those that relate to the overall safety of the water: biological contaminants, viruses, chemicals, and other materials. Water purification works as a chemical process usually using either iodine or chlorine. Although iodine is the preferred chemical, chlorine is often used in its place to make sure those with an iodine allergy are still able to consume the cleansed water. It is important to remember though that simply purifying water cannot always remove other impurities found in the water.

Samples

Because the need for a water filtration and purification system is so great when living off the grid, there is a large amount of information available. Often times, this amount information can be overwhelming. Below are links to a few key locations of information on getting started with your water system.

Berkey Water Systems seem to be one of the most popular systems available, particularly the stainless steel product. Although pricey, these systems meet all the requirements you would need to have a safe water source.

Creating a do-it-yourself water filtration and purification system is another direction you could go. Many have a secondary system like this in addition to their primary one.

Understanding the various ways to establish an off-the-grid water system is crucial to creating and maintaining the safest water supply for your family.

Conclusion

One of the most important elements of successfully living off the grid is having the ability to create and maintain a safe water supply. Simply understanding the differences between a water filtration system and a water purification system will help you go a long way in finding your own safe water source. It is important to also know that the best overall water system will be one that includes both a filtration element for large-scale impurities and heavy metals and a purification element to ensure the overall safety and taste.

©2011 Off the Grid News