Plastic bottled water is a major concern. While all of us may think that plastic bottled water is much better for you than tap water, many studies have proven that bottled water is pretty consistent with tap water. If you still just can’t get back to tap water, you can bring reusable jugs into your nearby grocery store and fill up there. Then you can transfer that water into reusable bottles at home whether you are going on a walk, hike, run, to work, to the gym, etc. There is no reason to continue to purchase individual plastic water bottles at the store. Most of these end up in our landfills and the numbers are staggering. Take a look at these fast facts from www.reusablebags.com and stop using plastic bottles. It’s a no brainer.
Americans will buy an estimated 25 billion single-serving, plastic water bottles this year. Eight out of 10 (22 billion) will end up in a landfill.
– Container Recycling Institute
Bottled water is a rip off - consumers spend an estimate $7 billion on bottled water in US each year.
Worldwide 2.7 million tons of plastic are used to bottle water each year.
– OneWorld
1.5 million barrels of oil is used annually to produce plastic water bottles for America alone - enough to fuel some 100,000 U.S. cars for a year.
– Earth Policy Institute
Imagine a water bottle filled a quarter of the way up with oil. That’s about how much oil was needed to produce the bottle.
– National Geographic
The bottled water you purchase is often in #1 PET or PETE bottles (polyethylene terephthalate), which may leach DEHA, a known carcinogen, if used more than once.
– Mothering.com
A growing problem – “in 1990, Americans bought 1.1 billion pounds of plastic in the form of bottles, according to the Container Recycling Institute. In 2002, they bought more than three times that - 4 billion pounds.”
– Christian Science Monitor
Increasing evidence of adverse health effects tied to Bisphenol A, or BPA a widely used chemical in the manufacturing of plastic polycarbonate bottles, including baby bottles, water bottles and food / beverage containers.
Like all plastic, these bottles will be with us forever since plastic does not biodegrade; rather, it breaks down into smaller and smaller toxic bits that contaminate our soil and waterways.
Along with plastic bags, plastic bottles are one of the most prevalent sources of pollution found on our beaches.
Many studies show that the quality of bottled water may be no better than tap water.