mykil
10-15-2008, 11:25 AM
https://green.yahoo.com/news/ap/20081015/ap_on_sc/impure_bottled_water.html
View Full Version : Think your bottled water is a clean source?
mykil
10-15-2008, 01:09 PM
https://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/10/15/MNGV13H0L4.DTL&tsp=1
Sylph
10-15-2008, 09:51 PM
Excellent issue, Mykil! Everyone should stop buying bottled water for many reasons!
I remember years ago buying a beautiful bottle of Yosemite water, in Yosemite, and laughing about the fact that it came from an L.A. municipal water tap.
https://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/1209-10.htm (https://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/1209-10.htm)
<CENTER><TABLE dir=ltr border=0 cellSpacing=0 width=574><TBODY><TR><TD vAlign=center>The number one (Aquafina) and two (Dasani) top-selling brands of bottled water in the U.S. both fall in the category of purified water. Dasani is sold by Coca-Cola, while Aquafina is a Pepsi product. As U.S. News & World Report explains, "Aquafina is municipal water from spots like Wichita, Kansas." The newsmagazine continues, "Coke's Dasani (with minerals added) is taken from the taps of Queens, New York, Jacksonville, Florida, and elsewhere." Everest bottled water originates from southern Texas, while Yosemite brand is drawn from the Los Angeles suburbs.
In June, a lawsuit was filed against Poland Spring, the nation's largest bottled spring water company. Poland Spring is a brand of Nestlé Waters North America, which used to be called Perrier Group of America. Nestlé Waters is owned by the Switzerland-based Nestlé S.A., the world's largest food company. Nestlé's 14 other brands of U.S. bottled water include Arrowhead, Deer Park, Aberfoyle, Zephyrhills, Ozarka and Ice Mountain.
The Green Response
More and more environmentalists are beginning to question the purpose of lugging those heavy, inefficient, polluting bottles all over the Earth. The parent organization of the World Wildlife Fund, the Switzerland-based World Wide Fund for Nature, argues strongly that the product is a waste of money and is very environmentally unfriendly. Co-op America concludes: "By far the cheapest-and often the safest-option is to drink water from a tap. It's also the most environmentally friendly option." Friends of the Earth says, "We might as well drink water from the tap and save all this waste."
The WWF argues that the distribution of bottled water requires substantially more fuel than delivering tap water, especially since over 22 million tons of the bottled liquid is transferred each year from country to country. Instead of relying on a mostly preexisting infrastructure of underground pipes and plumbing, delivering bottled water-often from places as far-flung as France, Iceland or Maine-burns fossil fuels and results in the release of thousands of tons of harmful emissions. Since some bottled water is also shipped or stored cold, electricity is expended for refrigeration. Energy is likewise used in bottled water processing. In filtration, an estimated two gallons of water is wasted for every gallon purified.
Pat Franklin, the executive director of the Container Recycling Institute (CRI), says nine out of 10 plastic water bottles end up as either garbage or litter-at a rate of 30 million per day. According to the Climate Action Network, when some plastic bottles are incinerated along with other trash, as is the practice in many municipalities, toxic chlorine (and potentially dioxin) is released into the air while heavy metals deposit in the ash. If plastics are buried in landfills, not only do they take up valuable space, but potentially toxic additives such as phthalates may leak into the groundwater. "It's ironic that many people drink bottled water because they are afraid of tap water, but then the bottles they discard can result in more polluted water," says Franklin. "It's a crazy cycle."
or metal salts can also thwart recycling efforts as can too high a ratio of colored bottles (such as Dasani's blue containers) to clear bottles. Because of the challenges, many recycling centers refuse to accept plastics. In fact, a fair amount of America's plastic recycling is done in Asia, where laxer environmental laws govern polluting factories and fuel is spent in international transport.
According to a report recently released by the California Department of Conservation (CDOC), more than one billion water bottles are ending up in the state's trash each year, representing enough plastic to make 74 million square feet of carpet or 16 million sweaters. Darryl Young, the director of CDOC, says only 16 percent of PET water bottles sold in California are being recycled, compared to much higher rates for aluminum and glass. "It's good people are drinking water, but we need to do more outreach to promote recycling,.
the expanding bottled water industry, which they claim threatens local wells, streams, wetlands and ways of life. Bottling companies may pump up to 500 gallons per minute, or even more, out of each well, and many wells run 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. Such operations have drawn intense opposition in Florida, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Texas, Michigan and Wisconsin. Many residents of these states depend heavily on groundwater for residential, agricultural and fishery use. In Wisconsin, for example, three out of four homes and 97 percent of municipalities obtain their water from the ground.
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I remember years ago buying a beautiful bottle of Yosemite water, in Yosemite, and laughing about the fact that it came from an L.A. municipal water tap.
https://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/1209-10.htm (https://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/1209-10.htm)
<CENTER><TABLE dir=ltr border=0 cellSpacing=0 width=574><TBODY><TR><TD vAlign=center>The number one (Aquafina) and two (Dasani) top-selling brands of bottled water in the U.S. both fall in the category of purified water. Dasani is sold by Coca-Cola, while Aquafina is a Pepsi product. As U.S. News & World Report explains, "Aquafina is municipal water from spots like Wichita, Kansas." The newsmagazine continues, "Coke's Dasani (with minerals added) is taken from the taps of Queens, New York, Jacksonville, Florida, and elsewhere." Everest bottled water originates from southern Texas, while Yosemite brand is drawn from the Los Angeles suburbs.
In June, a lawsuit was filed against Poland Spring, the nation's largest bottled spring water company. Poland Spring is a brand of Nestlé Waters North America, which used to be called Perrier Group of America. Nestlé Waters is owned by the Switzerland-based Nestlé S.A., the world's largest food company. Nestlé's 14 other brands of U.S. bottled water include Arrowhead, Deer Park, Aberfoyle, Zephyrhills, Ozarka and Ice Mountain.
The Green Response
More and more environmentalists are beginning to question the purpose of lugging those heavy, inefficient, polluting bottles all over the Earth. The parent organization of the World Wildlife Fund, the Switzerland-based World Wide Fund for Nature, argues strongly that the product is a waste of money and is very environmentally unfriendly. Co-op America concludes: "By far the cheapest-and often the safest-option is to drink water from a tap. It's also the most environmentally friendly option." Friends of the Earth says, "We might as well drink water from the tap and save all this waste."
The WWF argues that the distribution of bottled water requires substantially more fuel than delivering tap water, especially since over 22 million tons of the bottled liquid is transferred each year from country to country. Instead of relying on a mostly preexisting infrastructure of underground pipes and plumbing, delivering bottled water-often from places as far-flung as France, Iceland or Maine-burns fossil fuels and results in the release of thousands of tons of harmful emissions. Since some bottled water is also shipped or stored cold, electricity is expended for refrigeration. Energy is likewise used in bottled water processing. In filtration, an estimated two gallons of water is wasted for every gallon purified.
Pat Franklin, the executive director of the Container Recycling Institute (CRI), says nine out of 10 plastic water bottles end up as either garbage or litter-at a rate of 30 million per day. According to the Climate Action Network, when some plastic bottles are incinerated along with other trash, as is the practice in many municipalities, toxic chlorine (and potentially dioxin) is released into the air while heavy metals deposit in the ash. If plastics are buried in landfills, not only do they take up valuable space, but potentially toxic additives such as phthalates may leak into the groundwater. "It's ironic that many people drink bottled water because they are afraid of tap water, but then the bottles they discard can result in more polluted water," says Franklin. "It's a crazy cycle."
or metal salts can also thwart recycling efforts as can too high a ratio of colored bottles (such as Dasani's blue containers) to clear bottles. Because of the challenges, many recycling centers refuse to accept plastics. In fact, a fair amount of America's plastic recycling is done in Asia, where laxer environmental laws govern polluting factories and fuel is spent in international transport.
According to a report recently released by the California Department of Conservation (CDOC), more than one billion water bottles are ending up in the state's trash each year, representing enough plastic to make 74 million square feet of carpet or 16 million sweaters. Darryl Young, the director of CDOC, says only 16 percent of PET water bottles sold in California are being recycled, compared to much higher rates for aluminum and glass. "It's good people are drinking water, but we need to do more outreach to promote recycling,.
the expanding bottled water industry, which they claim threatens local wells, streams, wetlands and ways of life. Bottling companies may pump up to 500 gallons per minute, or even more, out of each well, and many wells run 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. Such operations have drawn intense opposition in Florida, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Texas, Michigan and Wisconsin. Many residents of these states depend heavily on groundwater for residential, agricultural and fishery use. In Wisconsin, for example, three out of four homes and 97 percent of municipalities obtain their water from the ground.
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