Tap water (running water, city water, municipal water, etc.) is potable water supplied to a tap (valve) inside the household or workplace. It is a principal component of "indoor plumbing", which became available in urban areas of the developed world during the last quarter of the 19th century, and common during the mid-20th century. The application of technologies involved in providing clean (potable) water to homes, businesses and public buildings is a major subfield of sanitary engineering. Calling potable water "tap water" distinguishes it from the other main types of potable water, such as water from rainwater-collecting cisterns, from village pumps (town pumps), or from streams, rivers, or lakes (whose potability varies).
Read more about Tap Water: Background, Potable Water Supply, Hot Water Supply, Fixtures and Appliances, Fittings and Valves, Regulation and Compliance, Waste Water, Water Flow Reduction/saving Water, Tap Water Versus Bottled Water, Cloudiness Due To Dissolved Gases
Famous quotes containing the words tap and/or water:
“A book is like a man—clever and dull, brave and cowardly, beautiful and ugly. For every flowering thought there will be a page like a wet and mangy mongrel, and for every looping flight a tap on the wing and a reminder that wax cannot hold the feathers firm too near the sun.”
—John Steinbeck (1902–1968)
“It is so manifestly incompatible with those precautions for our peace and safety, which all the great powers habitually observe and enforce in matters affecting them, that a shorter water way between our eastern and western seaboards should be dominated by any European government, that we may confidently expect that such a purpose will not be entertained by any friendly power.”
—Benjamin Harrison (1833–1901)