Do I Have Micro Plastics In My Filtered Water?

[Nabir14]

TL;DR Summary

I filled my water bottle using my schools water recycling filter and after leaving the water bottle untouched for days there are some dust like metarial floating inside the water. Is this micro plastic and is this even drinkable?

I took water from my schools water recycling filter.
It looks like this (image 1):

After filling my water bottle. I didn't drink from it and just left it untouched in my bag. After few days I took it out and it looks very unclear and some dust like metarials are floating inside the water.
This is how it looks like (image 2) and here I marked them incase they might be unnoticeable because of the image quality (image 3):

I did the same with the water I have at home and it is totally clear.
Here it is (image 4)

So if I leave a water collected from a recycling filter it has these dusty metarials in it and water which isn't collected from recycling filter is very clear.

My question is that is the water collected from recycling filter contain micro plastic? Is it drinkable? Overall is water recycling filters safe? (or was that specific filter my school is using maybe faulty?)

 

[Borek]

water recycling filter

Makes me wonder if it is just a filter, or if there is really a water recycling system at your school (as far as I know the latter being quite a costly and complicated system, but I am not following water treatment technology, so perhaps something has changed).

Things that precipitate out of water are most often related to temporary water hardness and the precipitate is just calcium carbonate (perfectly safe). Doesn't mean that's what you see, but there is no way to tell just by looking at pictures.

 

[Nabir14]

Makes me wonder if it is just a filter, or if there is really a water recycling system at your school (as far as I know the latter being quite a costly and complicated system, but I am not following water treatment technology, so perhaps something has changed).

Things that precipitate out of water are most often related to temporary water hardness and the precipitate is just calcium carbonate (perfectly safe). Doesn't mean that's what you see, but there is no way to tell just by looking at pictures.

Hmm I tried touching those little particles and some of them are plastic type and some are like wet dust.

 

[JT Smith]

Your comparison wasn't fair since you used a clean looking glass for the tap water and a well used looking plastic bottle for the filtered water. In other words, how can you be certain the stuff wasn't already in your bottle?

 

[Tom.G]

TL;DR Summary: I filled my water bottle using my schools water recycling filter and after leaving the water bottle untouched for days there are some dust like metarial floating inside the water. Is this micro plastic and is this even drinkable?

untouched in my bag. After few days I took it out and it looks very unclear

DO NOT DRINK IT.

If it was clear when first filled then turned cloudy, the most likely is bacteria growing rather well in the water.

Maybe your bottle was contaminated rather than the water source.

In any case, it would be a good idea to show the cloudy water to someone at the school that has the authority to enforce some action/investigation.

Glad you were curious enough to investigate!

Cheers,
Tom

 

[berkeman]

In any case, it would be a good idea to show the cloudy water to someone at the school that has the authority to enforce some action/investigation.

I would also recommend talking to somebody in authority at the school, but I would do a more controlled experiment first. Use clean Petri dishes or test tubes or similar to collect the water samples and let them sit for a couple of days. Do you have access to a microscope at school, especially with polarized light sources?

What year are you in school? How well do you know the science teachers at your school?