Friday, January 29, 2021

Do you drink bottled water?

"For years, the debate has raged on: which is better, bottled water, or tap?

Despite its ever-growing popularity in the US, bottled water is atrocious for the environment. To quote Harvard University’s Office for Sustainability, “The entire life cycle of bottled water uses fossil fuels, contributes to global warming, and causes pollution.”

Although water bottles are recyclable, Americans throw away about 80% of the bottles they use – and, by some estimates, Americans use 1,500 plastic bottles of water every second. Plastic bottles contribute immensely to global environmental crises, in part due to the fact that they disintegrate into microplastics, the presence of which are so ubiquitous researchers recently discovered them in the placentas of unborn babies. Bottled water takes 2,000 times the energy to produce and ship than its tap equivalent. The extraction and manufacturing processes used by bottled water corporations can also have negative environmental and economic effects, and amount to the privatization and commodification of a limited and invaluable resource to which all should have a universal right."

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