A clip shot from a car window has pulled more than 162,000 likes by asking one question. In it, @pokeshoplara zooms by and pans across shrink-wrapped pallets of bottled water sitting in open sun behind what the creator identifies as an H-E-B in Humble, Texas.
The clip is just a swift drive-by the back of the store, and an overlay text reads: “Water stored outside in Texas summer heat.”
The caption reads, “Who likes more microplastics in their water?” and tags @H-E-B. The clip never shows a date, a temperature, or how long the cases sat there.
Did H-E-B Respond?
A person called it a “microplastic special.” Another joked, “This is why I stick with tequila.”
Now, the thing is that H-E-B did respond, asking, “Where was this spotted? We want to follow up with the right Partners so we can make sure this is addressed.” But another person quipped, HEB was “only replying because they got caught.”
One “former H-E-B employee” had a less-than-savory explanation. “I guarantee you there was not enough space for that sh– on the shelves in the back by receiving,” they wrote. “Should this have happened? No. You know who’s not going to get in trouble? The corporate employees who have cushy jobs/salaries/PTO while the hourly store partners who bust their a– just to survive are the ones who will be reprimanded for this. I hope the team in receiving isn’t blamed for this? What else can they do? They can’t leave it on the trailer. The driver [has] to get to the next warehouse pickup.”
Should You Avoid Drinking Water That’s Been Sitting In the Sun?
Most single-use bottles are PET plastic, and research suggests heat and time draw more out of them. A 2014 University of Florida and Nanjing University study stored 16 bottled-water brands at 158 degrees Fahrenheit for four weeks—a scenario researchers deemed the “worst-case”—and found antimony rising as much as 319-fold at that heat.
“If you store the water long enough, there may be a concern,” lead researcher Lena Ma said, though only one brand there exceeded federal limits. Leaching can begin near 85 degrees and quicken past 100, toxin expert Dr. Paul Savage told Fox News, calling heat-baked bottles “a double-edged sword.”
A 2024 study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences found roughly 240,000 plastic particles per liter of bottled water. 90 percent of the particles were nanoplastics. The heat and sunlight, especially in a southeast Texas summer as shown in the clip, can speed that shedding, researchers noted.
“There’s actually many diverse types of plastics in a bottle of water,” lead author Naixin Qian said to CNN.
Subplot reached out to @pokeshoplara via TikTok message and comment, and to H-E-B via email.
