Water Quality In Qatar
With all the mis information on water quality in Qatar, I thought I would let everyone know the facts surrounding Water here in the Midle East.
I am the Plant Manager of a 60 million gallons a day power and water production plant in Ras Laffan.
In Qatar the HSE department of Kahramaa water is responsible for maintaing the water quality in Qatar.
The water produced at my plant is continously monitered by online equipment to ensure the specification laid down by Kahramaa is always maintained.
The specification of the water from Kahramaa is far tighter than the World Health Organisation guidelines, emphasis is on guidelines, they are not definitive.
When the water leaves the plant it is perfectly safe to drink, this also applies to all the other desalination plants in Qatar.
The only issue with the water is that from the desalination plant it is stored in reservoirs dotted around Doha, where it may pick up suspended solids i.e sand/dust e.t.c.
It is then fed to your home, the network for supplying can also contribute to suspended solids, it then normally enters a tank, again if you look at the bottom of you tank, you will notice a reddish brown substance, normally sand, rust.
If you filter this water (cheap and readily available), this water is as good if not better than some of the mineral water on the market, (which is mainly the Desal plant water with a few extra minerals added to enhance flavour (nothing else).
You do not need expensive reverse osmosis filters in your house as this will take out of the water, minerals we put in.
Hope that helps
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Man, yall stop joking, are you talking about the water safety of this desert...lol
tell me from where do you get your water? SEA!
so how come you talking about some kind of safety s***?
there is nothing safer in this part of the world, watch your self carefully!!!
Can u tell me what's the water hardness at Qatar?
Jango - Thanks very much on the informative and much needed subject here. I hope many got clarified with your valuable post. I just installed RO filter in home and feel whole of difference than a bottled water and a tap water. I really feels soft. Appreciate your thoughts and sharing.
firstly, thanks for the interesting posts on everything to do with drinking water.
got a question though..anyone know the sodium content/level in tap water here, the safe levels, and what happens if consumed in excess...for eg. hair loss, withered skin etc.
thanks.
...interesting topic!
It's purely coincidental that I reply to it during the first day of Ramadan.
I wasn't sure about water quality here, coming from Dubai where nearly everyone uses 5 gallon hot/cold water-dispensers at home/office, or smaller-sized bottled water, I just carried on doing the same thing in Doha.
I prefer the dispenser water, I like the fact that I can have piping hot water to put in the kettle, only a few seconds or so & its boiled ready for tea/coffee etc.
Likewise when cooking.
To have chilled water from a dispenser is great, yes bottled water in the fridge is similarly chilled, but personally I got fed up lugging boxes of water bottles to the car, up 20+ floors & now have Qatarat 5 G bottles delivered.
At only 5 QR per bottle I think its good value.
In Dubai we were paying nearly double that....
Coming from the UK where we are robbed blind it's refreshing in more ways than one!
A litre of water is on a par with the price of a litre of petrol....TRUE!!!!
And don't forget, fuel in the UK is horrendously expensive...
Back to the thread, I'm happy with my large bottles of water for drinking & cooking.
Only use tap water to shower/wash & to run both the dishwasher & washing machine.
Torque
If your still one of the stupid people who think that fluoride being added to drinking water is a good thing for general health and preventing cavaties in teeth, then read this article.
It provides evidence from multiple sources and examines why water is being fluoridated in the first place.
Fluoride is a by-product of Aliminium production and is a way for these multi-nationals to make an extra buck.
Sources are all extensively given as are references to blind and double-blind studies.
http://www.sustainabilitycentre.com.au/Ecologist.html
Stay away from Fluoridated water!
Is there flouride in the water.
Im from Vancouver, Canada and there is flouride in the water here.
So children do not need flouride suppliments.
What about Qatar?
Great information. I don't even cook with tap water. Feel content to stop that system. I expect I shall save a bit too.
Thanks for info jango warrior.
I was looking for water quality reports supplied by Kahramaa. Do u have the following
-water conductivity
-TDS
-Chloride
-Total Hardness (as CaCO3
-Total Alkalinity
-Iron ion
-Silica
-Phosphate
-pH
-Copper
yeah right!
You should see the state of the tanks at the plants where the bottled water is put in bottles!
These can be just as bad as home water tanks!
Anyway, who on here has died from water poisoning from either tap or bottled water? ;)
I'am sure about the high standards in Qatar regarding EHS, the water is surely clean. BUT i live in al-khor where there's no under ground piping. the water is supplied by tanks to the houses' tanks which usually are very big and old.
I use bottoled water for drinking, and two stages solid filter for cooking (which will be boiled).
Thank you jango, your contribution about this matter give enlightenment to many people using the tap.
"There's nothing we can do to change the past, if it teaches you a lesson profit from it then, forget it."
You are right that the chlorine that is put into the water will detoriate over time and especially with temperature, the house tanks that are supposed to be used are only meant to be day tanks, based on the water usage of an average household. It is not recommended to have a huge tank that can store a weeks supply.
One note on that issue is that water demand in the country is around 145 MIGD and the supply is only available to the majority of households for about 16 hours a day, therefore if you are regularly out of water which I am, then the refresh rate for your tank is high, so you shouldn't have a problem, but as you say each house will have to asess.
I have obviously tested my household water and it's absolutely fine, better than WHO standards, however we still filter for suspended solids.
Gulf laboroties can test your water, however it's not cheap and it's only a snapshot, I was only trying to indicate that it is safe to drink.
It will be good to see what the mineral contents of the utility water is when it is tested at the plant. IT will provide a point of comparision between bottled water and tap water.
Is there any public facility to have tap water tested in Doha?
http://yadiin.blogspot.com/
is it safe for babies as well when boiled?
Drinking water may reach international standards at the production plant, but I can say for certain that storing drinking water in roof-top tanks is not safe, as the chlorine dissociates, and bacteria can begin to breed. High temperatures increase the rate at which chlorine dissociates.
Building regulations in Qatar follow British Standards, yet drinking water is routinely stored in roof-top tanks because of low mains pressures. This is against the British Standard.
So tell me, if I agree with you that the water is safe at the production plant, will you agree with me that it isn't safe at the tap?
As I mentioned beforethe wtare here is safe and good to drink. But if you live in a house like mine, which has rusted pipes, I recommend you use bottled water. If you do not have this problem, it is like Jango warrior said. However make sure that you cleanout your water tanks on a regular basis....It can getquite juckky. Check lower & upper tanks though. Both of the need a good clean-out too.
Aisha-Taweela
I'm using tap water which has been filtered in my home country and here ...
maybe I use the product that introduced to tearstosmile ...
but here I just called them, I have seen the water tested in my country...
This filtered water (RO system, not just filtered) help reduce my scar/ keloids .. so I'm very glad I find it here.. I was planning to bring the filtered from Indonesia, but the instalation is not easy, so I just forget the idea... :)
However, I don't want to promote too much... I don't sell the product... just share my good experience... :)
thank you for the infos ... appreciate it. We take the bottle water because we concern with the cleanliness of our tank.
About two weeks ago, one representative of filter company visited my home.
He tried to prove that the water which is use very dangerious for health. Even he apply some majic to prov this. he tried to sell his product. I encountered him very well and kick out from my house. I dont know why filter companies use -ve approve to sell their products.
"keep Smiling"
jango warrior ...thanks
I use boiled Tap water at home.
I once used a 15 Ltr Bottled water Can to test "creating Bio-Gas at home" and later returned that Bottle-can after light cleaning.
I dont want to know who would be using that bottle-can now. (Chemically cleaned or otherwise). My guess would be Charan. He seems to be letting out quite some gas.
does taste good...I'm just used to using bottled water for drinking and cooking. The water back home has so much saline in it that it kills house plants..but is still under the legal limit for such...
You know..one of the things not addressed is the water tanks in the individual houses or apartment buildings...the water could be extremely pure coming INTo the house, but once in the tanks, no telling what's been growing in there..How often do they clean those out? Seems with the heat and all, that it would be a lovely huge Petri dish environment...
Most folks are about as happy as they make up their minds to be. --Abraham Lincoln (1809 - 1865)
I've been drinking both tap water and bottled water. Tap water is quite clean, and tastes much better than tap water I tried to drink elsewhere.
even with supporting documents, I'd still prefer bottled water. Thank you very much for the info.
I still drink bottled water, tho...heck I don't even drink the tap water back home!!
Most folks are about as happy as they make up their minds to be. --Abraham Lincoln (1809 - 1865)
Thanks for the info :)
Look at the sun and the shadow shall fall behind you...