Hey there,
I was reading about Matcha having worrying amounts of lead, but they don't tend to say what is an acceptible level, and what is a dangerous amount.
I found one tea that said it had 2.3ppm lead levels. Is that good or bad?
Thanks!
Posted Sep 29, 2015, 3:02 AM UTC
I doubt you could consume enough matcha for those lead levels to adversely build up and affect you before the caffeine makes your heart go out.
Try to look do the lead content on a food you eat and compare.
I found some decent info on heavy metals a while back but I can't seem to remember where it was. You might be able to find something with a search through the sub's history, I know this has come up before.
FWIW, from what I recall, it was mostly Chinese-made green tea powder that had problems with lead content. The majority of actual Japanese grown and processed matcha had little to no lead.
Since Japan is so close to China and the lead comes from the air, I'd be shocked to see that Japanese tea has no lead. Maybe I could contact various agencies to see what they say.
Just drink your tea. I wouldn't be afraid. It's easy to get scared of things when you put numbers to things.
Normally I would, but lead doesn't leave the system very quickly, and can accumulate into poisoning if too much collects over time.
There is lots more lead in older houses. Paint made before 1976 had lead in it. Window shashes can be a big lead hazard. http://www2.epa.gov/lead
So ppm is parts per million (unit used in most sciences and is otherwise the amount of mg of a chemical in a liter of substance.) As a handy conversion tool, 1ppm is equal to 0.0001%, so your matcha contains 0.00023% lead particulates. If you have 100 grams, then the amount of lead that would be in it would be 0.00023 grams. It probably not enough to hurt you if you drink a cup, but I would check the exposure levels for lead just in case. I know paint has to have less than 600 ppm so it can't hurt children.
Note: I do Quality Control Work