It’s time to get off the bottle
I was at an event recently where a friend bought me a bottle of water. I appreciated the generousity but felt at odds with the bottle. It was one of those moments of . . . there’s a phrase for it . . . ‘cognitive dissonance’.
Bottled water has been named the poster child for conspicuous consumption, and I would have to agree.
There are so many reasons for refusing to buy it that I am not sure if there’s room in this little column to list them.
And there are also a couple of good reasons for buying it, I must admit. It’s super-convenient and a healthier choice than sugary alternatives. Having said that up front, I now move into the opposite camp.
First up: municipal water in Canada and south of the border is more regulated than the bottled variety. Municipalities, at least in Ontario, are required to test water several times a day in order to meet provincial regulations.
Bottled water is regulated under the Canadian Food and Drugs Act as a low-risk product tested every one to three years.
Then there is the landfill issue. Yes, the empties can be recycled, but the statistics that I keep unearthing point out that the great majority of them are not.
A 2004 study by the plastics industry showed 65 per cent of plastic beverage bottles in Ontario were not recycled. An appreciable amount, considering Agriculture and Agrifoods Canada reports Ontarians consumed one billion litres of bottled water in 2006.
But aside from the landfill problem, even if every bottle were recycled, it still takes energy and oil to turn all that plastic into bottles, whether or not it is from recycled materials.
Alternatively, we could just turn on the tap.
http://www.waste-management-world.com/index/from-the-wires/wire-news-display/1348649089.html
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