i have been filling up six litre clear jugs from sprinkle water

at the street machine for one baht a liter for years

i know the owner and she says machine is cleaned weekly (hope true)

i just noticed after getting an upset stomach

there was a bit green (algae?) growing at the bottom of one

i inspected all bottles and there is only one other where it was obvious

so what is the best way to clean the 2 tainted jugs?

and the best way to prevent this?

what if i wash out and let dry?

does drying kill algae or just put it in hibernation?

i think two the jugs may have been sitting around a while

i was unsure if it is better to drink the freshest batch at all times and save the others as emergency back up

my thinking was less time to leach the plastic so cleaner

but after the algae i now think it is better to constantly date and rotate the containers

also is keeping them full to the brim better to give the water/algae less oxygen?

any other ideas?

thanks

A regular, unscented, hypochlorite bleach should zap the algae although it may leave a slight chlorine taste on the next fill (not harmful).

Do each bottle every week or so and you should be good to go.

Rotate your stock using the oldest first.

Good advice from Crossy. Also, keep the bottles out of sunlight.

I periodically wash all my containers thoroughly with soapy water and a little bit of bleach. I then rinse them very well, including letting them sit with clear water for a few hours. I then let them dry completely for a couple of days.

I use boiled water, so other than small bottles that I reuse, my containers are glass and they are frequently filled with boiling water.

All good advice

I dont think that the algae got in your bottles at the water dispensing machine, most of these machines use a reverse osmosis and UV light system that eliminates most contaminants including Algae. Most likely it got in your bottles through the air, the advise you got from others for cleaning should eliminate that.

Filling them to the top will not help , but it could not hurt. Algae uses oxygen dissolved in the water., the small air surface in the bottle will not significantly increase the dissolved oxygen in the water.

The most important advice you got was to keep your water away from sunlight. Algae need sunlight to photosynthesize nutrients and create chlorophyll (the green stuff you see) and propagate With out sunlight most algae will remain dormant.

We buy the big tanks and decant into litre and half bottles. Every 2 months we use a mixture of dish washing up liquid/baby bottle sterlizer to clean them out then give a good rinse.

Bottles always come out sparkling and no algae