One advantage of keeping “hurricane jugs” of stored potable water, is that it also works during a boil-water notice! I try to keep 5-6 days’ worth on hand for each household member.
In response to a question I got from someone on my personal page: Can the stored emergency potable water go bad?
My answer: It can but we’re vigilant about swapping it out. If it’s stored in plastic containers it can take on a plasticky taste.
Plasticky taste (and possible yucky chemicals related to storing in plastic bottles) is not a problem with glass bottles etc., but even in glass bottles if it’s stored in a place with too much exposure to light it can get algae.
All of these things are easily solved by not keeping the storage containers in a bright place, and/or not using light-permeable containers. But the most readily available and least expensive option for most of us is probably sturdy plastic jugs. Many of which are light-permeable.
If in doubt, I disinfect water with a few drops of household chlorine bleach and let it sit. Haven’t felt the need to do that though.
I have several of those big water cooler jugs which people toss at the curbside trash. They are about 5 or 6 gallons. Not sure why people throw away containers that are great for storing hurricane water, but there you have it.
And I feel that swapping it out at least once a year is key. I often swap ours out around this time of year, to use the water on the yard during the dry season.
(Generally I use zero city water on my yard at all. This past week I did a couple of Chris Searles -style trickle-watering experiments, which probably used a total of 40 gallons of city water via the hose I keep on hand for emergencies.)
Footnote: Our city came under a boil-water notice a couple days ago. They still haven’t lifted it. Our city’s public-works department is excellent, and they err on the side of caution. No known contamination has happened. But the city issued the notice because electric power outage caused the prescribed water pressure in the system to drop, which can cause harmful bacteria to multiply.
When there’s a system glitch like this, people can be tempted to point fingers at a person or department, but it’s really more an artifact of complex centralized systems. Many of our modern systems are inherently brittle. Such as a water system that relies on electricity to do its job. (Again, our public works department is excellent and I expect they do have various redundancy built-in, but glitches can and do happen, it’s just part of life.) As always, the best takeaway for us is to build parallel, redundant, resilient systems into our lives. Such as rainwater tanks, and hurricane water jugs.
PS. Chris Searles’ trickle-watering experiments, I have mentioned on my pages but if you haven’t yet seen, check out his BioIntegrity channel on YouTube. Here is a 48-second clip that’s very encouraging:
How to water big trees out of drought; 48-second video clip with Austin Youth Council.
And Chris also has many more detailed and lengthy videos in which he explains and documents his drought-busting experiments.
PS. Good news rain update! OK, I’m not trying to go all “post hoc ergo propter hoc” on you guys, but I’m just saying, 30 minutes after I did “big laundry” this morning (using about 7 gallons of precious stored water from the rain tanks) and hung it out on the line, it’s raining here! (“Big laundry” = giant sheet which I fold in half and use burrito-style, + thicker sheet used as coverlet, + pillowcase & other smaller items.)