I just heard about all the 'cancer' warnings on Nalgene type bottles.

Does anybody here know how much of a hazard they really present?!!!

TIA!

I believe your are referring to an issue with one of the components (bisphenol A) found in the hard Nalgene bottles baby bottles and other products. See the following.

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/fn/5712126.html


April 18, 2008, 10:38AM
Nalgene to nix BPA bottles due to consumer concern
By BEN DOBBIN AP Business Writer
© 2008 The Associated Press
ROCHESTER, N.Y. — Hard-plastic Nalgene water bottles made with bisphenol A will be pulled from stores over the next few months because of growing consumer concern over whether the chemical poses a health risk.

Nalge Nunc International, a division of Waltham, Mass.-based Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc., said Friday it will substitute its Nalgene Outdoor line of polycarbonate plastic containers with BPA-free alternatives.

"We continue to believe that Nalgene products containing BPA are safe for their intended use," Steven Silverman, general manager of the Nalgene business, said in a statement. "However, our customers indicated they preferred BPA-free alternatives and we acted in response to those concerns."

With more than 6 million pounds produced in the United States each year, bisphenol A is found in dental sealants, baby bottles, the liners of food cans, CDs and DVDs, eyeglasses and hundreds of household goods.

The U.S. government's National Toxicology Program said this week that there is "some concern" about BPA from experiments on rats that linked the chemical to changes in behavior and the brain, early puberty and possibly precancerous changes in the prostate and breast. While such animal studies only provide "limited evidence" of risk, the draft report said a possible effect on humans "cannot be dismissed."

Highly durable and lightweight, resistant to
stains and odors, and able to withstand extremes of hot and cold, screw-cap Nalgene bottles have been marketed as an environmentally responsible substitute for disposable water bottles.

The transparent reusable sports accessory is made at a factory in suburban Rochester that employs about 900 people.

Nalge Nunc was founded in 1949 by Rochester chemist Emanuel Goldberg. The lab-equipment supplier's product evolved in the 1970s after rumors spread about its scientists taking hardy lab vessels on weekend outings. That led the company to form a water-bottle consumer unit targeting Boy Scouts, hikers and campers.

In 2000, a new sports line of Nalgene-brand bottles offered in red, blue and yellow hues quickly became the rage in high schools and on college campuses.

Earlier this week, Wal-Mart Canada and other major retailers in Canada began removing BPA-based food-related products such as baby bottles and sipping cups from store shelves. Canadian health regulators were expected to announce the results of a preliminary review on BPA later Friday.

"I think the writing's on the wall for this chemical," said Aaron Freeman, policy director of Toronto-based Environmental Defence Canada. "You've got major retailers with huge market clout pulling BPA products ... and you've got consumers in droves who are opting for alternatives. They're a big late to the game, but they are responding to that consumer demand."

Citing multiple studies in the United States, Europe and Japan, the chemicals industry maintains that polycarbonate bottles contain little BPA and leach traces considered too low to harm humans.

But critics point to an influx of animal studies linking low doses to a wide variety of ailments _ from breast and prostate cancer, obesity and hyperactivity, to miscarriages and other reproductive failures.

An expert panel of 38 academic and government researchers who attended a National Institutes of Health-sponsored conference said in a study in August that "the potential for BPA to impact human health is a concern, and more research is clearly needed."

As I read this the issue does not apply to the older (cloudy white) Nalgene brand bottles - only the clear polycarbonate bottles.

quote:

Nalge Nunc International, a division of Waltham, Mass.-based Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc., said Friday it will substitute its Nalgene Outdoor line of polycarbonate plastic containers with BPA-free alternatives.

That's it, Oday450!

I have a couple of the older style Nalgene bottles that I'm going to ditch (think they contain BPA).

I'm glad to hear they are going to make NEW Nalgene containers that are BPA-free. The SIGG type aluminium containers are rather pricey.

I switched to stainless steel. I'ts nice because I can just put it on the stove for warm water. Just think if all those plastic bottles need to be replaced.....what a gold mine!!!!

the chef

Everytime you turn around there's something that someone claims is gonna kill ya! How have we survived as long as we have??

What do you mean "we"?!! *YOU* have only survived up to THIS date. And you have NO idea what clusters of cancer cells are developing in your body tissues. So, cut the silliness, and pay attention to the few voices of reason that appear from among the mindless promotion bullshit.

A great and cheaper substitute is a 32 oz Gatoraid or Poweraid Bottle. They are tough, lighter than Nalgene and the original contents even help you out when you are in the Mtns. When they get beat up, just recyle them.

Most European countries have banned plastics some time ago that contained that substance due to it's hazardous composition. Not so in the US but pressure is now on to have this chemical banned here.

The problem is that Bisphenol A is used in thousands of items ! The studies are not conclusive at all. ..Nalgene is the name of a company not a plastic !!! The plastic using Bisphenol A is polycarbonate . The copany makes another type.We unfortunately live in a chemical world .The American Chemical Society has said [in about 1990] that since 1965 there have been at least 8 million new chemicals invented , 70,000 used regularly !! More than one of those mimics hormones in the body. One thing rarely mentioned with regard to the chemicals is the additive effect on the immune system which has to deal with them all. As a result the immune system is overwhelmed ! The result is seen as an ever increasing rate of the immune system problems - cancer, allergies,auto-immune system problems like MS.

quote:

Originally posted by conifer:
What do you mean "we"?!! *YOU* have only survived up to THIS date. And you have NO idea what clusters of cancer cells are developing in your body tissues. So, cut the silliness, and pay attention to the few voices of reason that appear from among the mindless promotion bullshit.

Jeez, excuse me for not putting enough of the requisite smiley faces to indicate that I was speaking in jest. Guess I better start wearing my bike helmet too! FYI I've been going the Gatorade bottle route for several years now.

Take a look at the Laken drinking bottles, I picked one up a couple of weeks ago and those things are super light and easy to use. My Nalgene's are going in the trash.

quote:

one of us
Posted 21 April 2008 23:10 Hide Post
A great and cheaper substitute is a 32 oz Gatoraid or Poweraid Bottle. They are tough, lighter than Nalgene and the original contents even help you out when you are in the Mtns. When they get beat up, just recyle them.
Posts: 147 | Location: No. California | Registered: 19 April 2006

Ditto... works great!

quote:

Originally posted by Couesdeer:

quote:

one of us
Posted 21 April 2008 23:10 Hide Post
A great and cheaper substitute is a 32 oz Gatoraid or Poweraid Bottle. They are tough, lighter than Nalgene and the original contents even help you out when you are in the Mtns. When they get beat up, just recyle them.
Posts: 147 | Location: No. California | Registered: 19 April 2006

Ditto... works great!

The widemouth type (Nalgene and SIGG) containers thread directly onto certain types of water filters (like my Katadyn Vario). This feature makes them pretty convenient.

They also stand more abuse than the standard plastic beverage containers.

If you are in an area where a broken water bottle is not a life threatening matter, then used plastic beverage containers are probably good enough.

Personally, I'm going with the new style BPA-FREE Nalgenes or aluminum.

quote:

Originally posted by akpls:

quote:

Originally posted by conifer:
What do you mean "we"?!! *YOU* have only survived up to THIS date. And you have NO idea what clusters of cancer cells are developing in your body tissues. So, cut the silliness, and pay attention to the few voices of reason that appear from among the mindless promotion bullshit.

Jeez, excuse me for not putting enough of the requisite smiley faces to indicate that I was speaking in jest. Guess I better start wearing my bike helmet too! FYI I've been going the Gatorade bottle route for several years now.

I apologise for my harshness. All of us in the world today are subject to innumerable assaults on all our body tissues by newly synthesized chemicals against which we have no evolutionarily-developed protection. We have NO time!!! Sure, our potential lifespan is increased by diet and antibiotics and other life-supportive treatments.....but we are being poisoned in the meanwhile by life-destructive chemicals for which no adequate pre-testing processes are (or can be) applied.

quote:

Originally posted by mete:
The problem is that Bisphenol A is used in thousands of items ! The studies are not conclusive at all. ..Nalgene is the name of a company not a plastic !!! The plastic using Bisphenol A is polycarbonate . The copany makes another type.

Exactly and I think the statement that this warning does not apply to the older cloudy white nalgene bottles was missed. It's the hard, clear polycarbonate bottles that are in question.

I mostly use my Nalgene bottles when I'm backpacking. I figure the health benefits of backpacking outweight the health risks of drinking from a plastic bottle for a few days.

If you're scared of polycarbonate or lexan bottles then you should be really scared of all canned foods and drinks. The epoxy lining inside ALL canned food products contains BPA. There's not a good substitute for can liners.

The report is not conclusive, and may in fact be aimed at acquiring more research dollars. I can get cancer from too much exposure to sunlight, I am poisoned by Deet and can contract West Nile from mosquito bites.

Nobody gets out of this alive.

I just took my scratched and crappy looking Nalgene bottles back to REI. FULL REFUND and they didn't blink an eye!

Unless your grinding up the nalgene bottles and eating it, you should be fine. You'll be surprized what biphenol is in....just about everything!!!!

Not to worry ,the world is saved ! Nalgene has ceased production of polycarbonate bottles !

quote:

Originally posted by mete:
Not to worry ,the world is saved ! Nalgene has ceased production of polycarbonate bottles !

Yup! And they're making bottles now without BPA.

I enjoy playing 'Russian roulette' as much as the next guy....... but I don't think BPA tastes that good. SO I got rid of the BPA water bottles.

" Got rid of the BPA " and replaced it with what ??? Don't ever assume that other plastics don't leach out chemicals too !!! Glass, stainless steel ,and titanium are the safest !

Hmmm....I'm sure their going to come up with something for titanium, and stainless steel later down the road...nothing is safe any more!

This is just what I heard this weekend at Montana Outdoor Sports in Helena. The owner told me that Nalgene voluntarily came forward and consciously took the hit in order to increase awareness of this issue. They supposedly already have something in the pipeline to replace these polycarbonate bottles. He also said though that the only risk as he understood it was if you were to store a liquid or anything else for a longer period of time other than for immediate consumption. He also said that this bisphenol A was in almost everything plastic right now in the U.S.

quote:

experiments on rats that linked the chemical to changes in behavior and the brain, early puberty

P.S. I guess this might help explain all those Junior High girls that look like High School girls, and H.S. girls that look to old to be in College. When I was in college I used to cuss the hormones in the milk for this. I may have been cussing the wrong culprit.

I forked out over $20 for a SIGG. Good Cab Sauv tastes better from lined alu bottle!

To bring it up to date. Nalgene has ceased production of polycarbonate and replaced it with a copolyester.They also are selling Guyot stainless steel bottles now . SIGG does have some stainless steel bottles , though most are lined aluminum.Now to deal with the other 80,000 chemicals in our environment !

Sorry guys but stainless steel has nickel in it.
The teflon in non stick cookware is toxic when over heated.
Copper in your water pipes is a heavy metal and it's toxic.
Some reports have suspected aluminum is linked to Alzheimer's, others have linked corn syrup to diabetes, when overheated Delrin (acetal) decomposes into formaldehyde.
You can't run and you can't hide.

Thanks for mentioning the nickel in stainless and the aluminum/Alzheimers link. Oh, and most aluminum bottles are lined, usually with a plastic. By the way, softer, more supple plastics contain more chemicals such as dioxins and PCBs that leach off. It makes them less brittle, but they gas off quite easily. Ever wonder what the haze on the inside of your windshield is from? Ever notice that OLD cars don't do this?

WE"RE ALL GONNA DIE!

obama will save us

quote:

Originally posted by mete:
The problem is that Bisphenol A is used in thousands of items ! The studies are not conclusive at all. ..Nalgene is the name of a company not a plastic !!! The plastic using Bisphenol A is polycarbonate . The copany makes another type.We unfortunately live in a chemical world .The American Chemical Society has said [in about 1990] that since 1965 there have been at least 8 million new chemicals invented , 70,000 used regularly !! More than one of those mimics hormones in the body. One thing rarely mentioned with regard to the chemicals is the additive effect on the immune system which has to deal with them all. As a result the immune system is overwhelmed ! The result is seen as an ever increasing rate of the immune system problems - cancer, allergies,auto-immune system problems like MS.

The Specific plastic that made Nalgene famous isn't their polycarbonate bottles (the ones with the problem) but their polypropylene (soft) bottles.

As for the "aluminum Vs Alzheimers" link it's PURE junk science almost on par with the "Guns cause crime" & "Flies cause garbage" bullshit we see so much of.

It's only still mentioned because certain people keep mentioning it.

LIES that are often repeated may be accepted by the unwashed masses as truth, but that's only because misled people don't recognize the truth in the overwhelming flood of bullshit that drowns it.

Granted there are too many chemicals to really understand all their effects but a greater part of the prevelence of disease is subverting nature... we are all living longer without something else killing us, thus new diseases take up the slack.

People are alive and passing on genes that nature didn't intend to be passed on.

drugs to prevent miscarriages (Natures first way of saying "no") to drugs to prevent all sorts of otherwise fatal illnesses.

If I were a type 1 diabetic I'd be really pissed at mother nature, because she obviously wants those unlucky people dead.

IF aluminum is actually to blame for alzheimers it's more likely from the aluminum people smear into their underarms that is absorbed through the skin rather than from what they swallow mixed into their food.

If anyone is really concerned about what might leach out of their plastic bottles I have an "old school" method
of pre cleaning plastic.

FILL any new plastic bottles with whatever cheapest 100proof vodka you can find, fill the container 1/2-2/3 full and leave it on your bathroom sink counter and once or twice a day shake the hell out of it for 5min.

After several weeks dump the vodka in the toilet and repeat the process.

all the things people worry about leaching out into water are FAR more prone to leaching out in the presence of alcohol.

Frankly I never saw the point in the HARD plastic camping bottles. Polycarbonate is best used IMO for making music CD's

Basically I think Polycarbonate ("Lexan") it too brittle
and too prone to UV degradation to be useful for much else.

I have a collection of SIGG and MSR aluminum bottles
but they all contain either coleman fuel (in uncoated bottles)or fuel alcohol (in the red coated ones)

And for general information my "fuel alcohol" is
invariably Azeotropic ETHANOL and usually not the "Denatured" kind.

Personally I despise the formaldehyde/formic acid smell
that burning methanol produces, which I can smell
even with only 10% methanol mixed into ethanol that is a common formulation for "denatured alcohol".

AD

Why not do as the natives did and use a buffalo nut sac?

quote:

Originally posted by Moorepower:
Why not do as the natives did and use a buffalo nut sac?

It probably has bacteria in it, that will make you sick.
Grizz

While nickel can be a problem it depends on how much is dissolved .
Copper is , in small amounts, an essential mineral. In large amounts it's toxic. If you have acidic water you will dissolve copper from pipes and this can reach toxic amounts !! That's been demonstrated especially with mental symtoms !Green stain in your sink ? Copper !

" All of us in the world today are subject to innumerable assaults on all our body tissues by newly synthesized chemicals against which we have no evolutionarily-developed protection. We have NO time!!! Sure, our potential lifespan is increased by diet and antibiotics and other life-supportive treatments.....but we are being poisoned in the meanwhile by life-destructive chemicals for which no adequate pre-testing processes are (or can be) applied."

Hmm, do you speak as a Doctoral Level Medical Scientist?

I ask because after more than a quarter century in the field I would like to confirm which repeatable studies have led you to these conclusions.

We are living longer than ever,largely due to "synthesized chemicals" as you put it.

"We are all being poisoned"is quite an alarmist and unsupportable conclusion as well.

Have you been involved in LD50 studies, or even basic toxicological studies of "synthesized chemicals", if so, why do you espouse " no adequate pretesting processes?

Truly, I do not wish to sound overly harsh, but as I said, it seems alarmist and without basis to me.

None of us get out of this thing alive. (Unless ,I miss something )
Yet life expectancy about 100 years ago was only about 50, in 1800 about 35, in 1700 about 30 and 1600 about 25; me thinks we're doing pretty well.

Most of the extensions in life actually are more related to sanitation involving "synthesized chemicals" than to antibiotics; Frankly,the removal of natural poisons from our diets via "synthesized chemicals" may actually have been even a greater contributing factor.

While we are on the subject of diet; our current abundance and variety is largely the direct result of "synthesized chemicals".

Besides, aren't we here to hunt shoot, and have fun, while our daily grinds are left at the office?

quote:

Basically I think Polycarbonate ("Lexan") it too brittle

Polycarbonate is one of the toughest plastics and is used for bullet proof "glass" inertia bullet pullers, screen door glazing and a host of other application requiring high impact properties.

quote:

DuggaBoye-O

Crickets chirping............



Great post!



Tim

quote:

Originally posted by SR4759:

quote:

Basically I think Polycarbonate ("Lexan") it too brittle

Polycarbonate is one of the toughest plastics and is used for bullet proof "glass" inertia bullet pullers, screen door glazing and a host of other application requiring high impact properties.

In thin fluid containers it is too brittle.

Especially if compared to either Polyethylene
or the "other Nagalene", Polypropylene.

AD

Heck! I think I need a drink after readin' all this stuff!, someone pass the nalgene!

To hell with the plastic and metal. The best things are supplied in glass or oak kegs!! Too heavy you say......get stronger or don't walk so far!

Best thermos I ever had was glass lined!

Andy B

LOL, the whole controversy reminds me of a video I watched. I'm not saying that it isn't a potentially serious problem, I'm just reminded of the video because of the way people are either blase' or outraged. Anyway....

"Poll Takers" went around and asked people to sign a petition to ban "dihydrous mononoxide," a substance that is being used in over 90% of manufacturing and processing of food products.

This substance has been positively linked in thousands (if not hundreds of thousands) of deaths annually. It could kill from simply inhalation, and submersion in the substance could cause death in a matter of minutes!

Every one of the people polled signed the petition and some were highly outraged that the government didn't step in and immediately "do something" about this!

And what common name does this deadly substance, "dihydrous monoxide" go by? Water!