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Gone In 60 Seconds: UV Light Water Bottle Makes Any Water Drinkable In A Minute

February 15, 2012 / bacteria, camping, drinking, germs, glug glug glug, good ideas, i need a giant version of one of these installed in my apartment -- no lie the water comes out brown in the morning, i peed upstream just fyi, oh man i've drinken mud before, safety first, sure why not, the great outdoors, uv light, video, water

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First of all, I want it to be noted that any water is already drinkable, it just might might give you diarrhea and/or worms. Me? I'm fine with that. But for those of you who weren't raised in a cave by wolves there's Camelbak's 'All Clear' UV water bottle. It blasts the germs out of your water with killer UV rays.

The LCD screen on the cap pretty much walks you through it. It counts down the 60 seconds it takes to purify the water and includes information about your battery life. The only thing you have to do is swish the water around while the bulb zaps your water to ensure all the water is treated and you are good to go. The UV bulb is supposed to kill the bulk of all bacteria, viruses and protozoa -- in fact all but .01 percent of each type of intestinal nightmare per 25 ounces of water, according to stats released by the company.


The UV bulb is projected to last for 10,000 cycles that should clean approximately 101 ounces of water a day for seven years. Plus, the battery is rechargeable.

Not a bad idea, right? But let's say there's, oh I don't know, a turd in the bottle. Would it still kill all the bacteria in that? Would I need to break it up with a stick first? "How about you not scoop water with a turd in it?" Oh sure, Mr. Perfect Hand-Eye Coordination over here!

Hit the jump for an unbelievably cheesy commercial/demo.

UV bottle cap promises dead bacteria on the go [dvice]

Thanks to ash, who purifies water the old fashioned way: with a magic spell.

There are Comments
  • Bold_Edith

    > Makes ANY water drinkable in a minute

    ANY water?

    Even those contain loads of toxic, non-organic substances? Like chemicals and poisons?
    Wow! That's an amazing product.

  • And organisms that are protected by being bound up in solids in the (presumably) dirty water? They can be protected from chlorine that way, not sure about UV though.

  • I enjou diarrea but never had worms. I wanna try, let's drink L.A. tap water

  • I work in a molecular microbiology research lab as a biologist, and can tell you straight that UV light won't eliminate pathogens in a minute. For E. coli (one of the organisms tested against UV), it takes one hour of constant exposure, followed by a dark period of about 20 minutes. UV damages DNA, and bacteria have evolved a method of reversing UV damage to their genome via the enzyme photolyase. Photolyase is activated by white light, which is why a dark period is needed after UV exposure, so that the cells cannot recover and replicate.

    And that is just for E. coli; eukaryotic microbes would expectantly take longer to kill due to their slower replication process.

  • Guest

    Your alternative is obviously those carbon straw things or boiling water. I suppose this was invented because o' some fellow knew that they do have UV lights (but much more stronger) at those water processing plants. Those UV lights are just in addition to the other means of cleaning & preparing the water for general use.

    Fun note: 100% pure water isn't drinkable...rather fatal upon a certain dosage.

  • AL_Nemesis

    Sorry, this won't kill 
    amoebae  cysts -- for that, you'll need a filter to remove the or to boil the water to kill them all.  UV will reduce the risk, but not eliminate them.

  • people will die because of this.

  • Naomi Weatherdale

    Will it zap out the mercury too?  Because that shit is crazy-fun to play with.

  • BMan56

    Leaving it in full sun for 6 hours also works. Like for when civilization is destroyed and there's no more batteries.

  • Zander P

    Does this work in the cold?.... DERP!

  • MightyMolecule

    there's real science (and a somewhat legit business in UV ventilation filtering) involved in dimensional UV proximity, intensity, and susceptibility factors of the various pathogens one might expect to gulp from time to time - not including bedroom action. it would surprise the majority how hardcore some viruses for instance can tan in the ever-loving glow of ultraviolet before their sunscreen fails. sans for the sheer lack of volumetric space putting samples close what i assume is short wave, there is absolutely nothing out there supporting a 60 second flash doing jack or shit besides selling wares to hypochondriacs.

  • Zander P

    Wow, way to be on the ball, Geekologie. These have been out for years and the only thing different is the LCD screen. 

    Seriously, you guys have been posting lame not-so-thought-provoking stuff these days.

  • I've never heard of it either. It's only been out 12 seconds in my life.

  • Zander P

    That's prolly 'cause you're a nerd who holds himself up in a basement all day. I'm an avid hiker. Been using UV filtration for at least two years, it's been around since 2006 I think.

  • Yeah! Everyone here is a hiker that knows about and uses UV filtration bottles. Daniel is SO lame.

  • I've never heard of this.

  • Zander P

    Same goes for you, sir.

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