Hot water dissolves lead more quickly than cold water and is therefore more likely to contain greater amounts of lead. Never use water from the hot water tap for drinking, cooking, or making baby formula.
Hot water dissolves lead more quickly than cold water and is therefore more likely to contain greater amounts of lead. Never use water from the hot water tap for drinking, cooking, or making baby formula.
Chemical engineer here. The difference in temperature between your cold and hot water supplies is what the problem is, and I would imagine this is not a problem at all in modern plumbing systems. Your cold water supply is usually about 50-60 deg F (10-15 C) while your hot water supply us usually set to 140 F (60 C). Solubility of some lead salts in water are given in this table with lead chloride being about 0.8 g/100mL at 10 C and 1.98 g/100mL at 60 C, so about 2.5x more soluble. The rate itself is a more complicated relationship, but it increases rapidly as well. Temperature has a big effect on these things.