Seeing bluish water in your tank or bowl is weird and frustrating. While the blue water might not be harmful, it cannot be reassuring, especially if you just invested in a new commode a few days or weeks ago. The blue color could be a result of the blue tablets you’ve been using to clean your toilet or even the high copper levels in your home’s water supply system.
What Does It Mean If Toilet Water Is Blue?
Here are some reasons why your toilet water is blue and tips on resolving the mess.
1. Blue Toilet Cleaning Tablets
You may have noticed that most of the cleaning tablets and dyes that most people use in their homes are blue in color. These cleaning agents might cause the bluish shade you usually see in your toilet tank or bowl. That is actually the same case when it comes to the toilet tablets that most of us put under the rim of our toilets.
The toilet cleaner of toilet rim tablets can easily leak into your toilet’s water and eventually create a blue ring around your toilet bowl. So, while the toilet cleaning tablets do a fantastic toilet cleaning process, they come with some disadvantages.
2. Corrosion
Copper pipes can cause your water to turn blue when it hits the tap. Copper drain pipes are more common in older houses. As time goes by, they can become corroded. The corrosion can cause the yellowing you see in the water. Copper will corrode when it comes in contact with chlorine and oxygen in your tap water. Oxidized aluminum pipes have a blue tint rather than the red color you usually see when you think of copper pipes. If you notice blue color in your toilet bowl, it is a good indicator that it’s time to replace the pipes in your home, as they are probably worn out.
3. High Copper Levels
It is common for copper to get into our water because there are many places in our country where it is very abundant. Having copper in your water can cause a lot of damage to your pipes. When you see blue water, try talking to your neighbors. If they have the same problem, it could mean that there are high levels of copper in the soil in your town. If someone else has experienced the same thing, they will be a good person to ask if you have experienced something similar. And if that is the case, maybe there is nothing wrong with your piping system.
Is Blue Toilet Water Dangerous?
The bluish shade or ring you see in your toilet bowl toilet often indicates your pipes have been oxidized. However, the bluish stains don’t affect your toilet’s safety and flush quality. You’ll need a hard brush and some pumice stone to scrub off the blue stains on your toilet bowl or tank. While using chemical cleaners may help, it’s best to consider scrubbing off the bluish shade.
But remember that if the problem is with your plumbing, you’ll need the help of an experienced plumber to fix the blue water issue. Blue water from cleaning products that you use in your home isn’t dangerous. In fact, blue water from cleaning products like Clorox can be incredibly useful.
But high levels of copper in your water supply system can have dangerous effects. For instance, if you have high levels of copper in the water, you could have stomach cramps, vomiting symptoms, and even nausea. There is no harm in trying to touch the water when you flush it — as long as you don’t ingest it. Furthermore, you may develop a skin rash if you are allergic to copper.
Copper leaks can affect every part of your plumbing system, including the water pipes. Copper pipes and fixtures can be damaged by copper corroding in the water. That includes things like the toilet flapper and the flush valve.
Building up minerals can cause clogs in your rim ports, and if your plumbing gets really old, you will also have problems with your electricity. The copper pipes in your house will likely have outlived any of their original warranties. If the rust in the pipes in your home is bad enough, they will start to leak, making your home unsafe.
Blue water from your toilet can be dangerous, so do not let your children or your pets drink water that appears blue. If your water looks blue when you turn on the water main, it means there is too much copper in the water. If that is the case, it can cause problems for your health.
In short, if your family includes young children or animals, you should not allow anyone to use blue cleaning products that change the water in the toilet. If copper poisoning is probable to cause these symptoms, have your water tested. In fact, copper poisons can cause your organs to fail.
Danger to the Environment
Blue water from a disinfecting chemical can cause much damage to the environment because bleach kills all the beneficial bacteria needed to break down biodegradation materials. This problem is particularly bad when you have a septic tank because bleach kills the good bacteria that help us to decompose waste material.
Bleach that is left in toilets can cause discoloration to parts of toilet bowls and cause damage to the porcelain in the toilet bowl. If your house is located in a large city or county, blue water from sewer pipes is a relatively minor problem but still alarming.
Is it Safe to Use a Toilet with Blue Water?
It’s still safe to use the water you get from the toilet, even though it’s blue. It may be that the water is blue due to a cleaning product that has been used on the pipes, but it is fine to flush the toilet and have it clean.
Also, if you notice that the toilet water is blue due to old copper pipes, it is fine to flush the toilet with it. But if water is leaking because of old copper pipes that are more than a year old, you need to call a plumber. Your pipes are likely worn out when the water becomes blue, especially if other water fixtures are also pouring out blue water.
Some of the other colors that toilet water can become include brown, pink, orange, or something in between. Some toilet water can turn brown or brownish-colored because of rust in the pipes or bacteria build-up in the pipes. Your water may look different because it may contain rust, algae, or copper. In most cases, if the toilet water looks brown or red, it’s most likely that the pipes are rusting.
Why Is The Toilet Water Reddish?
If the water from your bathroom has a dark yellowish tint, it could be that the pipes are rusting. You will need to analyze the water to see what chemicals are in your water. Sometimes people find their water turning pink because harmful bacteria usually accumulate around damp areas. Remember, bacteria also love moist environments, and pink bacteria can grow on almost any damp or wet surface.
Shower curtains are one of the most popular places for pink bacteria to grow. Bacteria that cause infections in bathrooms are called “Serratia marcescens.” Although it’s safe to be exposed to this bacteria for a short time, too much exposure may cause serious health problems.
If the water from your toilet is suddenly changing to a pinkish color, it could be that rust is causing problems in your pipes. Serratia Marcescens is a harmless bacteria usually found in bathrooms when humidity and dust mix. It’s likely to grow in bathrooms when renovations are being done and when it’s humid, caused by sawdust and other environmental conditions.
There are blue cleaning tablets that contain bleach, and they will clean and deodorize your toilet. But if you buy a completely chlorine-free tablet, it will last a good long time. You might be able to find a tablet that only turns the water in the toilet tank a shade of white.
Final Thoughts
Any homeowner or commercial building manager normally doesn’t expect to see blue water in the toilet bowl or tank! Don’t be frustrated with the bluish shades, as you can easily solve the issue without too much difficulty. The solution to this problem is steering clear of using blue dye or tablets in cleaning your toilet and perhaps having a qualified plumber over to replace the corroded copper pipes in your sewer system.
Blue water from a gray toilet doesn’t mean the world will end. Chemical cleaning products or even copper might cause it. But a reddish-brown tint on your copper pipes indicates they need to be replaced. It would be best if you got a plumber to do a plumbing assessment as soon as possible.
