Water Storage (5 Years Later)

Water storage = life. Have you ever forgotten to pay your water bill or maybe your well pump gave out? Both have happened to me and I’m pretty sure I hit the faucet to turn it on (with no results) at least 50 times a day. We all use a LOT of water. What’s the mantra, about 4 gallons per person, per day when you factor in hygiene and cooking? Try flushing and refilling a toilet tank every time with those Costco water bottles, they will go quick. I did it with water bricks but it was still a PiTA. Long story short you NEED some form of water storage if the tap runs dry. Not because a major SHTF event happened and the supervolcano exploded but rather, you need some water on hand to get you through 3-5 days of the struggle. Just last week I worked on my own water storage and made some updates, here is how that went. I should note this water was stored 5 years ago, a few drops of bleach in each container and upon opening all were still good to go (stored in my garage mostly out of the sunlight).

Water Bricks

I love water bricks. While 55 gallon drums are great for bulk storage they are not easy to move around or transport and you aren’t exactly tipping one up to fill a toilet tank or take a shower with. Hence water bricks…easily filled and stacked and easy to bring into the house one at a time. When my water well was down I used these quite a bit, if you don’t want stackable storage simply go to your grocery store and get the 7 gallon office type jugs, those work too.

I do add bleach to my water because I personally believe it helps keep things safe, truth be told my process for filling them isn’t exactly clean room standards but I do my best. As previously stated when I popped these suckers open the water was fine, years later.

55 Gallon Drums

Bulk storage it is with these fellas and they are relatively cheap to purchase. Like the water bricks, the water in these was fine years later but out of an abundance of caution and probably boredom I decided to empty and refill them. I added 5 teaspoons of bleach to each container and feel good about it. ALSO…my girlfriend suggested that we put them on furniture dolly’s for ease of movement. Genius! Here is the old setup, on wood to prevent any leaching.

Here is the new setup on wood / furniture dolly’s.

The Bottom Line

In my opinion water storage should be in layers. I too have the 40 packs of Costo water bottles for daily use. I have water bricks, 55 gallon drums, 7 gallon office jugs, camping water jugs, as well as two sources full of around 400 gallons each. If all else fails we have a creek and generator backups for the 450 ft deep well. Water is life, never forget that. Have comments, let me know below.