Comments on: Your Take: Ultrapure Awesome Bottled (Tap) Water

By: Russell

Russell — Sat, 01 Sep 2007 12:11:52 +0000

Consumption of bottled water really took off in spring of ‘92; so much so that manufacturers of the bottles couldn’t keep up with demand. This coincided with the introduction of the ’sport cap’ on bottled water, by Rim Rock water of Arizona. Other water bottle accesories were developed, including the Sip Top, with which I was involved. Numerous straps, carriers, insulators, etc., came to market to fill demand.
I’ve made a nice chunk of money off the bottled water market, as have many other people I know. One young woman financed her college education, and learned significant marketing and business skills, through the sale of her bottle holder/insulator.
I’m not saying that buying bottled water is smart, financially, or that it is ecological. But the demand is there, so why not exploit the business potential?
P.S. My latest water insulated bottle carrier is made from recycled polyester fabric, which is made from recycled P.E.T.E. water bottles.

By: kitty

kitty — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 20:17:05 +0000

I used to buy it. The taste of our municipal water leaves a lot to be desired, and we had some letters from the town discussing some problems with meeting standards they were working to resolve. After they resolved the problems and I added BRITA to remove chlorine and such, I stopped buying bottled water.
As to fluoride, some of us – those who like to drink tea for example – are already getting enough.

By: Jennifer C

Jennifer C — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 19:31:09 +0000

I thought The Financial Philosopher would be interested in reading this…

link

…the truth about the flouride they add to municipal water.

By: Dan

Dan — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 18:12:03 +0000

Another thing to add, the cost to transport the bottles to the bottling plant, the bottled water to the sales outlets across the country, the trip from you house to the store, the trip home, the trips for the huge garbage or recycling trucks to come pick up all the empties. The carbon footprint of all that gas/diesel, and hours of peoples time, just can’t argue enough that this is wasteful, needless consumption. I have a refridgerator filter, and a brita pitcher, and drink tap water. And yes, sometimes, when I manage to get the little bottles, I reuse them with filtered water.

By: Chris

Chris — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 17:39:00 +0000

I like those little plastic bottles. We buy a big case of them and reuse them by filling them with filtered tap from our fridge. We are still on the case we bought 2 years ago. They handle just fine in the dish washer and are disposable if they do become too ragged to stand upright. Having little bottles of water in the fridge is a real convenience and we drink more water because of it (and can quickly take water with us so we aren’t tempted to buy a bottle on the road).

By: devil

devil — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 17:04:21 +0000

Yeah, I’m in the “thinks it’s ridiculous” camp. My tap water tastes great so I just buy bottled for the bottles. I reuse them over and over.

By: Victor

Victor — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 16:28:27 +0000

I buy and drink ONLY bottled water for one reason: Pipes. The tap water may be coming out pure from the public utility but as soon as it leaves there it has to find it’s way to your home some how. Cracked or old pipes will add nasties to your basic tap water. Someone suggested that I boil the water before I drink it to kill the nasties but doesn’t that increase my carbon footprint?

There are about 5 water mains that go bad in my city nearly every week so I know the pipes must all be in bad shape.

By: lisa

lisa — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 16:24:00 +0000

I think reverse osmosis at home is the way to go. Not every state’s tap water tastes great. In Arizona our tap water is so hard and chlorinated it tastes like pool water. Drink from the tap? No thanks.

By: mapgirl

mapgirl — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 15:51:37 +0000

Some water is not ‘filtered’ per se, but run through a reverse osmosis machine. I don’t know why but lots of water filtered that way makes my tongue feel funny.

FWIW, I find that waters do taste different and if the tap water tastes gross, I’m going to drink bottled. (As I am at my nephew’s house this week). But tap from home, run through BRITA tastes just fine. I’m not completely against it, but knowing its place is important.

By: Patrick

Patrick — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 15:18:13 +0000

Incoming trackback/response.

I had to dedicate an entire post to cover this one.

By: Dan

Dan — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 15:13:04 +0000

Love bottled water…local tap water tastes terrible. Don’t think twice about its impact on the environment to be honest.

By: Kevin Spring

Kevin Spring — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 14:24:01 +0000

I thought I would also add that a lot of bottle water does not really come from “natural springs.” If the water you drink was bottled in the state in which you bought it, then the federal government cannot regulate the trade and cannot guarantee that it came from “the snow of mountaintops.”

For example when I buy Dasani water, it is bottled in the state I live. Well guess where they get the water? From the local water municipality. They get the water from the same facet you have at home, put it through a filter (reverse-osmosis in some cases), and then sell it for a lot of money. The profit margin of bottled water is so huge that companies would never stop bottling water

By: Kevin Spring

Kevin Spring — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 14:17:54 +0000

When I was in college, the environmental club I was in calculated that the school sold 250,000 plastic bottles a year through vending machines and the cafeteria. This was only with a student body of 10,000, which means each student bought about 10 bottles a year. We started a recycling program since recycling plastic in my area is economically feasible. Most of the plastic used in the U.S. is made here. If you were to try to recycle plastic in Kansas, the transportation cost to a recycle plant will use more energy than what you would save to recycle the bottle.

You should check out Penn & Teller’s Bullshit episode 5 of season 2, where they debunk many myths on land fills and recycling.

The best way to recycle plastic bottles is to not throw them away. I buy a case of water bottles and after I drink the water, I fill it back up. BTW Penn & Teller have another episode on bottle water, episode 7 season 1.

By: Tim

Tim — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 14:16:59 +0000

living in a Third World country, bottled water is necessary. granted, i do have a distiller, which i use most of the time.

By: The Financial Philosopher

The Financial Philosopher — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 13:45:27 +0000

Convenience is the American way but I’ll add one more problem with bottled water: The vast majority do not have flouride, which, as most people know, is absolutely essential for healthy teeth. Tap-water, however, does have flouride in it.

Blueprint does a good job of covering the obvious financial drawbacks. Here’s another: Long-term, rotten teeth are not only a health risk but also quite expensive!

Cheers…