Don’t believe me. Just call Coke’s 800 number like I did and just ask them. Look up the MythBusters episode (they were doing bottle rockets with compressed air and water).

BTW, I made my own five-pound-tank system, similar to yours except I used air hose quick connects & shutoff valves and the all metal PepBoys tire valve (with the schraeder valve removed so that 8 liters of CO2 can dissolve into 2 liters of water. Works like a charm at 40 to 50 psi. Even works down to 35 psi but keep in mind the partial pressure of CO2 at 1 atmosphere is 20 psi gauge reading so you need more than that.

As for your CamelBak bottles, I didn’t realize you had the “old” version, which makes it more interesting that CamelBak altered their manufacturing process, just like Nalgene did. And why would they admit that their old bottles were unsafe when it would just lose them customers, versus companies who have maintained BPA-free products for many years prior (like Sigg and Klean Kanteen)?

You’re very caught up on the “numerous studies” bit, and completely disregarding the source of funds for those studies, not to mention the difference in study context in older studies compared to those of today, where the hormonal issues of BPA weren’t considered in regards to their long-term effect on younger children.

Forgive my appeal to emotion by mentioning your family, but I find it ironic that you’ve made similar decisions regarding other issues (such as what your pregnant wife could and could not eat) and yet the BPA issue is something you ignore as pseudo-science.

I find it somewhat ironic that you take issue with terminology like “concern” and “possible health risks” from one side of the debate, but you totally dismiss what I’d consider even more abstract phrasing like “difficult to interpret”, “occasionally contradictory”, and “considerable reservations” from the other side. Sounds to me like the “BPA is safe” side, at least in Europe, isn’t being very concrete about their declarations either. Speaking of phraseology, what does Japan consider an “acceptable risk”, since their statement clear establishes that acceptable risks are possible given current exposure levels. Or, are you blaming this translation on Engrish?

You keep postulating that there are no scientifically valid results, and yet you can find many references to the study done by Frederick vom Saal from the University of Missouri at Columbia to get you started. But hey, if you want to dismiss anything but industry-sponsored studies and volunteer your daughter to “acceptable risks” as per the Japanese’s findings, so be it.

The Japanese are excellent at weighing what kinds of risks are acceptable, by the way. That whole bombing of Pearl Harbor thing really worked well for them.

In contrast to the recent actions in North America, in January 2006 the German Federal Institute for Risk Assessment announced that polycarbonate baby bottles are safe and state that published research on the health effects of Bisphenol A are “difficult to interpret and [is] occasionally contradictory”. An assessment released later that year by the European Union’s Food Safety Authority reached a similar conclusion, expressing “considerable reservations” about the biological significance and robustness of the low-dose exposure studies on rodents. In 2007 Japan also concluded that “the current exposure levels of BPA will not pose any unacceptable risk to human health that a ban is not needed.”

“Concerns” and “possible health risks” just don’t cut it for me. Either give me scientific valid results or nothing, otherwise we are just dealing with fear and hypotheses. If studies confirm these “concerns” I will be the first to throw out BPA products, but until then I won’t let fear win the day. Certainly if the EU, Japan, Germany, the U.S. government, and the chemical companies don’t see a problem, I can’t see any validity in your statement of “industry-wide recognition.”

I never thought I would see the day when you side with Canada over the majority of advanced nations…

When were your quotes made? Old studies? The Washington Post recently stated:

…the Food and Drug Administration has deemed [BPA] safe largely because of two studies, both funded by an industry trade group.

Sounds a lot like Big Tobacco lobbying, to me. At present, the House Energy and Commerce Committee wants to investigate the Weinberg Group, who previously defended Agent Orange, tobacco, and teflon. They were hired to defend BPA by the industry who puts it into their products.

Scientists first flagged possible health risks of BPA more than a decade ago. From 1997 to 2005, 116 studies of the compound were published, many of them focused on its effects in low doses. Of those funded by government, 90 percent showed a health effect linked to BPA. None of the industry-funded studies found an effect; all of them said BPA is safe.

Where’s the independent review? The draft report issued by the NTP is the closest thing we have to an “overall” estimation of the dangers, having reviewed over 400 studies since 2007. Their concern is, at minimum, reflected in the FDA’s current task force on BPA, which all comes from a 10-year old study that the plastics industry conveniently dismissed.

Safety assessments of bisphenol A (BPA) conclude that the potential human exposure to BPA from polycarbonate plastics and epoxy resins is more than 400 times lower than the safe level of BPA set by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. This minimal level of exposure to BPA poses no known risk to human health.

The use of polycarbonate plastic and epoxy resins for food contact applications has been and continues to be recognized as safe by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, the European Commission’s Scientific Committee on Food, the United Kingdom Food Standards Agency, and other regulatory agencies worldwide.

Researchers from government agencies, academia, and industry worldwide have studied the potential for bisphenol A (BPA) to migrate from polycarbonate products into foods and beverages. These studies consistently show that the potential migration of BPA into food is extremely low, generally less than 5 parts per billion under conditions typical for uses of polycarbonate products. At this level, a consumer would have to ingest more than 1,300 pounds of food and beverages in contact with polycarbonate every day for an entire lifetime to exceed the safe level of BPA set by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Consequently, human exposure to BPA from polycarbonate plastics is minimal and poses no known health risk.

Maybe I don’t need to inject myself with 20 pounds of plastic, I just need to eat a half ton of canned peaches everyday for the rest of my life.

I fixed that quote for you.

The NTP is part of the United States Department of Health and Human Services, and contrary to your claims, their quote is based on their current, ongoing study of BPA, so let’s stop with your “definition-relativity” based on who’s using which and what word.

Furthermore, NTP’s quote is not based on danger posed from the amount used in animals, it’s based on current levels humans (primarily young children) are exposed to, not 20-pound plastic overdoses.

An again, CamelBak bottles are BPA free, as per the very clear designation of such on CamelBak’s homepage.

As for Japan, they’ve already begun reducing BPA via industry-wide volunteering.