Exploited by the Bottle: Looking beyond the economics and examining the high cost of bottled water
When you pop the cap off of that bottled water in front of you, do you ever wonder where the water actually came from? How about the manufacturing processes involved in its production? Besides the satisfying hydration, do you ever appreciate the men and women who pumped the oil to produce the plastic bottle, packaged the water and finally delivered the package, wrapped so conveniently, to the store for you?
The excesses of the bottled water industry are innumerable.
Worldwide, 2.7 million tons of plastic are used each year to make water bottles, but in the United States, less than twenty percent of these bottles are recycled. The plastic waste that is not recycled often ends up in the middle of the ocean, suffocating birds and disrupting the hormonal balances of fish.
The total estimated energy needed to make, transport and dispose of one bottle of water is equivalent to filling the same bottle one-quarter full with oil. In addition, three liters of water are used in manufacturing a one-liter bottle of water. On top of all this, bottled water can cost up to ten dollars per gallon. That’s compared to less than a penny a gallon for water from the tap.
One International Bottled Water Association expert estimated that almost 40 percent of bottled water originally comes from a city water system.
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