[shafaifer]

I hope this question can hit to this forum and I hope you can help me with it.
I am analysing Na and Fe contents in bottled water and tap water by AAS. I would like to find a reliable paper listing these contents (or at least one of them, tho I prefer sodium) in "real" spring water so that I can compare values to my investigated bottled water. I would like to verify if the producers of this bottled water brand speak the truth when labeling mountains and "spring water". Until now I have researched www.Google.com without success.   

[Borek]

No idea what a "real" spring water is. Every spring is different, and composition of salts dissolved will be in every case different.

[Arkcon]

I suppose there are standards for those chemicals that are enforced for drinking water, at a variety of governing levels.   But, like Borek: said, I really doubt there's a recognized standard for: "oh yes, this is spring water, and that over there, isn't."  What would you call the other water -- "not spring" or pond water, or lake water or tap water?

[curiouscat]

One analysis I googled up says  Sodium (Na+)   4.0 ppm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hot_Springs_National_Park#Composition_of_the_water

Intuitively sounded very low to me. I'd have guessed higher. So maybe this one ain't representative.

[curiouscat]

This paper seems to have more authoritative data & on lots of different springs though all in the same area. Though these are all hot springs & maybe the non  hot springs are very different?

Fe seems less than 0.1 ppm but this study puts Na at 100 ppm & above. This sounds like the range I'd have intuitively expected.

http://pubs.usgs.gov/bul/1303/report.pdf

[Darryl1]

In the US, many food products have standards of identity that must be met to call a food a food.  For example, "Beef Stew" must contain at least 25% beef by weight as one aspect of it.  I did a search for the standard identity for spring water and this was pulled from the Code of Federal Regulations 21CFR Sec. 165.110 Bottled water.

(vi) The name of water derived from an underground formation from which water flows naturally to the surface of the earth may be "spring water." Spring water shall be collected only at the spring or through a bore hole tapping the underground formation feeding the spring. There shall be a natural force causing the water to flow to the surface through a natural orifice. The location of the spring shall be identified. Spring water collected with the use of an external force shall be from the same underground stratum as the spring, as shown by a measurable hydraulic connection using a hydrogeologically valid method between the bore hole and the natural spring, and shall have all the physical properties, before treatment, and be of the same composition and quality, as the water that flows naturally to the surface of the earth. If spring water is collected with the use of an external force, water must continue to flow naturally to the surface of the earth through the spring's natural orifice. Plants shall demonstrate, on request, to appropriate regulatory officials, using a hydrogeologically valid method, that an appropriate hydraulic connection exists between the natural orifice of the spring and the bore hole.

In a prior section, it defined "mineral water" and that required at minimum 250PPM dissolved solids.  It made no mention of minerals in spring water, therefore it could be any level.
Here is the whole regulation:
http://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/cdrh/cfdocs/cfCFR/CFRSearch.cfm?fr=165.110&SearchTerm=bottled%20water

-d

[shafaifer]

I do give sincere thanks to the all of you.

[Furanone]

This article gives a good range of sodium contents in a variety of bottled water products including spring waters. Unfortunately, no amounts for iron are given.

Title:Mineral concentrations in bottled water products: implications for Canadians' mineral intakes
Author(s):Jesse Bertinato and Jessica Taylor
Source:Canadian Journal of Dietetic Practice and Research. 74.1 (Spring 2013): p46.
Document Type:Report
DOI: http://dx.doi.org.subzero.lib.uoguelph.ca/10.3148/74.1.2013.46

Here is a table from article with some results: