I really don’t want to come off as some sort of condescending euro-snob, but is the state of tap water in the US so bad so that you have to purchase plastic bottles of water?

US consumption of bottled water in 2017 was 42 gallons per capita (160 liters) [1].

That's behind Italy (188 liters per capita) and Germany (175 liters per capita). The EU average is 117 liters per capita [2].

[1] https://www.statista.com/statistics/183377/per-capita-consum...

[2] https://www.statista.com/statistics/455422/bottled-water-con...

That's fascinating, thank you! Excellent site as well, looking forward to dig throuhg it.

In some parts of the US, notably coastal California, the taste, smell, and color(!) of the natural water supply can be quite poor. It has more to do with geology than tap water safety and remediating the natural chemistry is cost prohibitive in extreme cases. For example, in the western volcanic regions of the US, pristine water sometimes has an unpleasant sulfur taste -- perfectly safe to use but no one wants to drink that because it tastes awful due to natural water chemistry.

Many parts of the US have excellent tasting tap water, and in those places everyone drinks it. California is one exception, and many parts of it have infamously discolored and poor tasting/smelling water. When I lived in California I drank bottled water, most everywhere else I drank tap water. California water is safe, it just tastes terrible and is sometimes discolored because of where it comes from.

I agree with everything. But the treatment of water in California and its safety is subjective. The amounts of salts in the tap water is very unhealthy in certain regions. Even though this water is deemed safe by local governments, I still wouldn’t drink it.