擺脫自來水：美國的“喝生水”熱潮從何而來？

SAN FRANCISCO — At Rainbow Grocery, a cooperative in this city’s Mission District, one brand of water is so popular that it’s often out of stock. But one recent evening, there was a glittering rack of it: glass orbs containing 2.5 gallons of what is billed as “raw water” — unfiltered, untreated, unsterilized spring water, $36.99 each and $14.99 per refill, bottled and marketed by a small company called Live Water.

舊金山——在彩虹雜貨店(Rainbow Grocery)——位于這座城市的教會區(qū)的一間合作社，有一個品牌的水很受歡迎，經常缺貨。不過，前不久的一個晚上，有一排貨架上擺滿了這種閃閃發(fā)光的商品：一只只裝著2.5加侖“生水”的球形玻璃罐，也就是未經過濾、未經處理、未經消毒的泉水，每罐36.99美元，續(xù)罐14.99美元。它是由一家名為“活水”(Live Water)的小公司罐裝和銷售的。

“It has a vaguely mild sweetness, a nice smooth mouth feel, nothing that overwhelms the flavor profile,” said Kevin Freeman, a shift manager at the store. “Bottled water’s controversial. We’ve curtailed our water selection. But this is totally outside that whole realm.”

“它有一種淡淡的甜味，口感順滑，并沒有什么特別的味道，”這家店的值班經理凱文·弗里曼(Kevin Freeman)說，“瓶裝水有爭議。我們已經減少了水的品類。但這種水完全不在那個范疇之內。”

Here on the West Coast and in other pockets around the country, many people are looking to get off the water grid.

在西海岸和美國的其他地區(qū)，很多人都在尋求脫離正規(guī)的水源。

Start-ups like Live Water in Oregon and Tourmaline Spring in Maine have emerged in the last few years to deliver untreated water on demand. An Arizona company, Zero Mass Water, which installs systems allowing people to collect water directly from the atmosphere around their homes, began taking orders in November from across the United States. It has raised $24 million in venture capital.

在過去幾年里，出現(xiàn)了俄勒岡州的“活水”公司和緬因州的“電氣石泉”(Tourmaline Spring)等初創(chuàng)公司，按需供應未經處理的水。亞利桑那州一家名為“零量水”(Zero Mass Water)的公司所安裝的系統(tǒng)可以讓人們直接從自家周圍環(huán)境中收集水。它從11月起開始接受來自全美各地的訂單，目前已經籌集了2400萬美元的風險投資。

And Liquid Eden, a water store that opened in San Diego three years ago, offers a variety of options, including fluoride-free, chlorine-free and a “mineral electrolyte alkaline” drinking water that goes for $2.50 a gallon.

三年前在圣迭戈開業(yè)的“液體伊甸園”(Liquid Eden)水店提供多種選擇，包括無氟水、無氯水，以及每加侖售價2.5美元的“礦物質電解質堿性”飲用水。

Trisha Kuhlmey, the owner, said the shop sells about 900 gallons of water a day, and sales have doubled every year as the “water consciousness movement” grows.

店主特麗莎·庫爾邁(Trisha Kuhlmey)表示，該店每天銷售約900加侖水，隨著“水意識運動”的發(fā)展，銷售額每年都翻倍。

What adherents share is a wariness of tap water, particularly the fluoride added to it and the lead pipes that some of it passes through. They contend that the wrong kind of filtration removes beneficial minerals. Even traditional bottled spring water is treated with ultraviolet light or ozone gas and passed through filters to remove algae. That, they say, kills healthful bacteria — “probiotics” in raw-water parlance.

追隨者的一個共同點在于，他們都對自來水感到擔憂，尤其是其中添加的氟化物以及有些水經過的鉛管。他們認為，不恰當?shù)倪^濾方式會去除有益的礦物質。就連傳統(tǒng)的瓶裝水也要經過紫外線或臭氧處理，還要通過過濾器去除藻類。他們認為，這會殺死健康的細菌，也就是生水中的“益生菌”。

The quest for pure water is hardly new; people have been drinking from natural springs and collecting rainwater from time immemorial. The crusade against adding fluoride to public water began in the 1950s among Americans who saw danger in the protective measures that had been adopted over decades to protect the populace from disease and contamination.

對純凈的水的追求早已有之。人們從遠古時代起就飲用天然泉水，收集雨水。反對往公用水中添加氟化物的運動始于20世紀50年代，因為有些美國人認為，幾十年來為保護民眾免于生病或受到污染所采取的這些保護措施其實存在危險。

But the off-grid water movement has become more than the fringe phenomenon it once was, with sophisticated marketing, cultural cachet, millions of dollars in funding and influential supporters from Silicon Valley.

但是，脫離正規(guī)水源的運動已經不再像從前那樣只是少數(shù)現(xiàn)象了，它有著成熟的市場營銷、文化聲望、億萬資金以及硅谷權勢人物的支持。

One recent morning in the hills of Berkeley, Calif., Cody Friesen, the founder and chief executive of Zero Mass Water, was inspecting water collection panels he had installed for his investor Skip Battle, a longtime tech leader who now sits on the boards of LinkedIn, Netflix and OpenTable.

不久前的一個上午，在加州伯克利的山上，“零量水”公司的創(chuàng)始人兼首席執(zhí)行官科迪·弗里森(Cody Friesen)在檢查他給投資人斯基普·巴特爾(Skip Battle)安裝的水收集板。巴特爾是資深技術領袖，現(xiàn)在是LinkedIn、Netflix和OpenTable的董事會成員。

The system — called Source, which retails for $4,500, including installation — draws moisture from the air (the way rice does in a saltshaker) and filters it, producing about 10 liters of water a day and storing about 60 liters. The goal, Mr. Friesen said, is to make water “that’s ultra high quality and secure, totally disconnected from all infrastructure.”

該系統(tǒng)被稱為“源”(Source)，零售價為4500美元，含安裝費。它從空氣中吸取水汽(就像放在鹽瓶中的米那樣)，然后過濾，每天產出約10升水，儲存約60升水。弗里森表示，目標是生產“質量和安全水平超高的水，完全擺脫任何基礎設施”。

“Just take a breath of air,” said Mr. Friesen, a professor of materials science at Arizona State University. “Take a deep breath. No matter how wealthy or poor you are, you can take a breath and own that air that you breathe. And yet water — the government brings it to you.”

“你吸一口空氣，”弗里森說。他是亞利桑那州立大學(Arizona State University)的材料學教授。“深吸一口。不管你多么富有或多么貧窮，你都可以吸一口空氣，那一口空氣是屬于你的。但是水——水是政府給你的。”

Mr. Battle’s system runs on power from its own small solar panel. It feeds into a tap set up in his stone garden, where he goes to drink. He said he’s been making all his meals and drinks with it.

巴特爾的水收集系統(tǒng)由它自己的小太陽能電池板供電。水流向他在石頭花園里安裝的一個水龍頭，他去那里接水。他說他一直在用它做飯、做飲料。

Mr. Battle poured himself a glass. “The water from the tap just doesn’t taste quite as refreshing,” he said. “Now is that because I saw it come off the roof, and anything from the roof feels special? Maybe.”

巴特爾給自己倒了一杯水。“自來水的味道就是沒這個清爽，”他說。“是因為我看見它從屋頂上下來的嗎?屋頂上來的任何東西都很特別?也許是吧。”

The most prominent proponent of raw water is Doug Evans, a Silicon Valley entrepreneur. After his juicing company, Juicero, collapsed in September, he went on a 10-day cleanse, drinking nothing but Live Water. “I haven’t tasted tap water in a long time,” he said.

生水最主要的支持者是硅谷創(chuàng)業(yè)家道格·埃文斯(Doug Evans)。在他的榨汁機公司Juicero去年9月倒閉后，他進行了為期10天的凈化，除了“活水”，什么也不喝。“我很久沒喝過自來水了，”他說。

Before he could order raw water on demand, Mr. Evans went “spring hunting” with friends. This has become more challenging lately: The closest spring around San Francisco has recently been cut off by landslides, so reaching it means crossing private property, which he does under cover of night.

在能按需訂購生水之前，埃文斯和朋友們一起去“采水”。這個做法最近開始有些困難了：前不久，前往離舊金山最近的泉水的道路被山體滑坡切斷，所以要去那里，需要穿越私人地產，他只好趁著夜色前去。

“You have to be agile and tactile, and be available to experiment,” he said. “Literally, you have to carry bottles of water through the dark.”

“你必須靈活、敏捷，愿意嘗試，”他說。“你是真的要帶著一瓶瓶水在黑暗中行走。”

At Burning Man, the summer festival in the Nevada desert that attracts the digerati and others, Mr. Evans and his R.V. mate brought 50 gallons of spring water they had collected. “I’m extreme about health, I know, but I’m not alone with this,” Mr. Evans said. “There are a lot of people doing this with me. You never know who you’ll run into at the spring.”

夏天在內華達州沙漠地區(qū)舉行的火人節(jié)(Burning Man)吸引著計算機達人和其他人。在火人節(jié)上，埃文斯和他的露營車伙計帶來了打來的50加侖泉水。“我知道，我對待健康有些極端，但并不是我一個人這樣，”埃文斯說。“很多人都和我一樣，都在這么做。你永遠不知道會在泉邊碰到誰。”

The founder of Live Water, Mukhande Singh, started selling spring water from Opal Springs in Culver, Ore., three years ago, but it was a small local operation until this year. Marketing materials show Mr. Singh (né Christopher Sanborn) sitting naked and cross-legged on a hot spring, his long brown hair flowing over his chest.

活水公司的創(chuàng)始人穆漢杰·辛格(Mukhande Singh)三年前開始售賣取自俄勒岡州卡爾弗蛋白石泉(Opal Springs)的泉水，但一直只是當?shù)氐囊患倚∑髽I(yè)，直到今年。營銷材料上，辛格(原名克里斯托弗·桑伯恩[Christopher Sanborn])赤身盤腿坐在一眼溫泉上，棕色的長發(fā)飄揚在胸前。

Pure water can be obtained by using a reverse osmosis filter, the gold standard of home water treatment, but for Mr. Singh, the goal is not pristine water, per se. “You’re going to get 99 percent of the bad stuff out,” he said. “But now you have dead water.”

可以用反滲透過濾器得到純凈水，這是家庭水處理的標準做法，但對辛格來說，目標不是純凈的水本身。“你會過濾掉99%的不好的東西，”他說。“但剩下的是死水。”

He said “real water” should expire after a few months. His does. “It stays most fresh within one lunar cycle of delivery,” he said. “If it sits around too long, it’ll turn green. People don’t even realize that because all their water’s dead, so they never see it turn green.”

他說，“真正的水”應該幾個月后就死了。他的水就是這樣。“在一個月周期的送貨期內是最新鮮的，”他說。“如果存放太久，水就會變成綠色。人們甚至意識不到，因為他們所有的水都是死水，所以他們永遠看不到水變綠。”

Mr. Singh believes that public water has been poisoned. “Tap water? You’re drinking toilet water with birth control drugs in them,” he said. “Chloramine, and on top of that they’re putting in fluoride. Call me a conspiracy theorist, but it’s a mind-control drug that has no benefit to our dental health.” (There is no scientific evidence that fluoride is a mind-control drug, but plenty to show that it aids dental health.)

辛格認為公用水被污染了。“自來水?你喝的其實是含有避孕藥的馬桶水，”他說。“氯，除此之外他們還加氟進去?？梢哉f我是陰謀論，但這是一種精神控制藥物，對我們牙齒的健康沒有好處。”(沒有科學證據(jù)表明氟是一種精神控制藥物，但大量證據(jù)顯示它有助于牙齒健康。)

Talk like Mr. Singh’s disturbs Dr. Donald Hensrud, the director of the Healthy Living Program at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. What the raw-water partisans see as dangers, he says, are important safety measures.

像辛格這樣的言論讓明尼蘇達州羅切斯特梅奧診所(Mayo Clinic)的健康生活項目(Healthy Living Program)負責人唐納德·亨斯魯?shù)?Donald Hensrud)感到擔憂。他說，重要的安全措施被支持飲用未經處理的水的人當成是危險。

“Without water treatment, there’s acute and then chronic risks,” Dr. Hensrud said, including E. coli bacteria, viruses, parasites and carcinogenic compounds that can be present in untreated water. “There’s evidence all over the world of this, and the reason we don’t have those conditions is because of our very efficient water treatment.”

“不進行水處理，就存在急性和慢性風險，”亨斯魯?shù)抡f，包括大腸桿菌、病毒、寄生蟲和致癌物，都可能出現(xiàn)在未經處理的水里。“全世界都有這方面的證據(jù)，我們沒有出現(xiàn)這些情況是因為我們的水處理非常有效。”

Dr. Hensrud said he has noticed more interest in alternative water sources; a patient recently asked questions about a raw water he had been drinking. “There are people, just like with immunizations, that don’t accept the status quo,” Dr. Hensrud said.

亨斯魯?shù)抡f，他已經注意到人們對非傳統(tǒng)水源的興趣增加。一名患者最近問了一些問題，是關于對方一直在喝的未經處理的水的。“有些人，就像對待免疫接種一樣，不接受現(xiàn)狀，”亨斯魯?shù)抡f。

The rules for selling bottled water are imposed by states and the Food and Drug Administration, which does not specify how water be treated but sets acceptable amounts of chemicals and bacteria at a low level. State and federal inspectors make unannounced visits to bottling plants to test for harmful contaminants.

有關銷售瓶裝水的規(guī)定是由各州和食品與藥品管理局(Food and Drug Administration)制定的，食品與藥品管理局未對如何處理水做明確規(guī)定，但制定了可接受的，較低的化學制品和細菌含量。州和聯(lián)邦檢查人員會突然造訪裝瓶廠，檢測有害污染物。

Seth Pruzansky, the chief executive of Tourmaline Spring (whose website touts its “sacred living” water), got an exemption from the State of Maine in 2009 to sell his water untreated. “The natural food industry has been in the dark ages when it comes to water,” he said. “Now there is a renaissance.”

2009年，電石泉公司(在其網(wǎng)站上宣傳“神圣活水”)的首席執(zhí)行官塞思·普魯贊斯基(Seth Pruzansky)在緬因州獲得銷售未經處理的水免稅的權利。“就水而言，天然食品行業(yè)一直處在黑暗時期，”他說。“現(xiàn)在復興了。”

The movement against tap water, like the movement against vaccines, has brought together unlikely allies from the far left and the far right. Conspiracy theorists like Alex Jones, founder of the right-wing website Infowars, have long argued that fluoride was added to water to make people more docile. Similar claims can be heard in the largely liberal enclaves where Live Water is seeing interest spike.

和反對疫苗的運動一樣，反對自來水的運動讓不太可能成為盟友的極左翼和極右翼走到了一起。像右翼網(wǎng)站Infowars創(chuàng)始人亞歷克斯·瓊斯(Alex Jones)這樣的陰謀論者長期認為，在水里加氟是為了讓人們變得更加聽話。在以自由派為主的飛地，也能聽到類似的說法。這些地方對活水公司的興趣劇增。

“Fluoride? It’s a deathly toxic chemical,” said Vanessa Kuemmerle of Emeryville, Calif., who does landscape design for large tech companies. She said she was an early adopter of raw water, and has noticed many of her clients following suit.

“氟?這是一種致命的有毒化學物，”加利福尼亞州埃默里維爾的瓦妮莎·屈默勒(Vanessa Kuemmerle)說。為大型科技公司設計景觀的她說自己是早期飲用不經處理的水的人，并且注意到她的很多客戶紛紛效仿。

“They’re health-conscious people that understand the bigger picture of what’s going on,” she said. “Everyone’s looking for an edge: nootropics, Bulletproof coffee, better water.”

“他們都是有健康意識的人，明白正在發(fā)展的大趨勢，”她說。“所有人都在尋找優(yōu)勢：益智藥、防彈咖啡、更好的水。”

The health benefits she reported include better skin and the need to drink less water. “My skin’s plumper,” she said. “And I feel like I’m getting better nutrition from the food I eat.”

她反映的健康益處包括膚質改善和喝水需求減少。“我的皮膚更飽滿了，”她說。“而且我感覺自己從吃的食物中獲取了更好的營養(yǎng)。”

In the community of tap-water skeptics, many talk about water the way others might about fine wine.

在對自來水持懷疑態(tài)度的群體中，很多人像其他人討論上等葡萄酒一樣討論水。

“My friends who drink spring water, when they come over now they’re like, ‘Oh yeah, give me the good stuff,’” said Amanda Thompson, a writer in San Francisco. “The consciousness around water is changing.”

“我一些朋友喝泉水，現(xiàn)在他們來我家時，會說‘太好了，給我好東西，’”舊金山作家阿曼達·湯普森(Amanda Thompson)說。“圍繞水的意識正在改變。”

Not everyone has been receptive. Many San Franciscans are proud of their tap water, which comes from Hetch Hetchy, a reservoir in Yosemite National Park.

不是所有人都接受。很多舊金山人為他們來自優(yōu)勝美地國家公園(Yosemite National Park)赫奇赫奇(Hetch Hetchy)水庫的自來水感到自豪。

“My landlord lives across the street and thinks I’m crazy,” Ms. Thompson said. “He gave me a big rant around Hetch Hetchy water and how the water’s so good. I always hope he’s not around when there’s a delivery.”

“我的房東住在街對面，覺得我瘋了，”湯普森說。“他和我大談了一通赫奇赫奇水庫的水，和這水怎么怎么好。我總希望送水來的時候他不在旁邊。”

Raw water is such a nascent business that there’s debate over what exactly to call the liquid. Daniel Vitalis hosts a podcast, “ReWild Yourself,” that promotes hunting for food and gathering water; he started the site called FindASpring.com to help people locate springs. He prefers the term “unprocessed water,” which echoes the idea of processed versus unprocessed food.

未經處理的水是一個新興行業(yè)，以至人們圍繞到底該怎么稱呼這種液體展開了爭論。丹尼爾·維塔利斯(Daniel Vitalis)主持了一檔名為《返璞歸真》(ReWild Yourself)的播客節(jié)目，宣傳獵取食物和取水。他創(chuàng)辦了名為FindASpring.com的網(wǎng)站，幫助人們尋找泉水。他更喜歡“未經加工的水”這個說法，這與加工和未加工食品的概念相呼應。

“I don’t like ‘raw water’ because it sort of makes people think of raw sewage,” Mr. Vitalis said. “When you say ‘live water,’ that’s going to trigger a lot of people who are into physics and biology. Is it alive?”

“我不喜歡‘未經處理的水’這個說法，因為它在一定程度上會讓人想到未經處理的污水，”維塔利斯說。“說‘活水’又會刺激很多熱衷研究物理和生物的人。水是活的嗎?”