Movement Against Bottled Water Gains Municipal Adherents

Tap Into The City's campaign for The Suffolk County Water Authority is getting more attention. The New York Times, Sunday Long Island edition has a great story about it:

LONG ISLAND residents love to stay hydrated on the go — they consumed half a billion bottles of water in the past year. The evidence is everywhere: plastic bottles stuffed in treadmill cup holders at the gym, lined up neatly along the buffet table at office meetings and, even more often, tossed empty on the side of the road.

But where you won’t find them sold, at least, is at the public park, Town Hall or any other municipal facility in Babylon Town.

In September, the Town Board decided to pull single-serve water bottles from the town’s vending machines. Instead, water fountains are being upgraded and the town is offering free reusable bottles to residents. The 20-ounce containers are made from plastic that will not leach chemicals, according to the Suffolk County Water Authority, which created the bottles as part of its recently begun campaign to help people “kick the habit” of buying bottled water.

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Water and What Else?

As consumers hunker down to cope with hard economic times, an environmental group in Washington has offered a suggestion for saving money: Get your water from the faucet not a bottle.

That's what we suggest, too. Bottled water costs on average $10 a gallon and mostly comes from the same sources that tap water comes from. Last year, Americans spent more money on bottled water than they did on Ipods or movie tickets: $15 billion! What a waste of money!

In a time of economic instability, we all need to think of ways to save money.

Top 10 Ways to Save Money:

#1: Kick The Bottled Water Habit!

Check this interesting story from the New York Times:

New York Times Editorial, October 17th:

The Environmental Working Group released a report Wednesday that charged that some bottled waters were “no different than tap water.” And it found fertilizer residue, pain medication and other chemicals in some major brands.

While a lot of bottled water may be as pure as promised in those alluring commercials, the real problem is telling which is which. Public water supplies are regulated by the federal government. Not so for bottled water. The Food and Drug Administration does have some oversight, but bottled water is not very high on their long list of priorities.

The International Bottled Water Association, which represents most of the industry, has voluntary standards to make sure there are no contaminants. The association encourages (but does not require) bottlers to release pertinent information about what’s in their water when consumers call and ask.

Among the states, so far only California has set strict standards to make sure carcinogens and other contaminants are not being sold as something purer than that mountain stream usually pictured on the labels.

Some metropolitan water is better than others, of course, and New Yorkers are proudly unafraid to ask for their four-star tap water at the fanciest restaurants. The federal government requires all public water works to tell consumers once a year what is in their water and whether it meets federal standards.

Those public reports are not always as helpful as they should be. Some are printed in ant-size type and best understood by chemists. But at least they are readily available, and the same detail should be publicly available for bottled water.

For the extra cost and the promise of added purity — and the mound of plastic in landfills — that bottled water should be as good or even better than the less-expensive stuff that comes out of a tap. And consumers should be able to see certified data that prove it.

New York’s Suffolk County Water Authority Joins Tap Into The City in Encouraging Residents to “Kick the Bottled Water Habit”

“Tap Into the City” Producing Reusable Water Bottles for Municipalities and Organizations Nationally

Boston, Chicago, San Francisco and Others to institute similar programs

New York City, September 23, 2008 – Long Island has joined the growing number of American communities dedicated to helping the environment by encouraging residents to drink their local tap water and “kick the bottled water habit”. The announcement came last week from the Suffolk County Water Authority, which is offering environmentally friendly, reusable water bottles produced by Tap Into the City www.tapintothecity.com, free of charge.

Contrary to commonly held beliefs; tap water is safer than bottled water because of more rigorous mandated drinking-water standards. “Suffolk County’s water meets and exceeds federal and state water standards, and is tested far more often than bottled water. It truly is ‘Long Island’s buried treasure.’ explained Water Authority Chairman Michael A. LoGrande. “Many people may not realize that most bottled water consumed here on Long Island actually comes from municipal tap water piped into Coke and Pepsi bottling plants.”

“Buying bottled water daily - or even occasionally - may seem harmless enough, but last year Americans consumed 50 billion single-use water bottles. 85% of these bottles ended up in landfills,” said Sandy McKelvey, founder of Tap Into the City. “We are gratified that Suffolk County has taken the lead and pledged to work with their citizens, urging them to drink local tap water and thereby help build a more sustainable future.”

Single-use plastic water bottles have a devastating effect on the environment, producing 2.5 million tons of the greenhouse gas CO2 annually from manufacturing and hundreds of thousands of tons of CO2 from transportation. Also highly wasteful, the disposable bottles require more than 17 million barrels of oil annually in the U.S. alone to produce. Coupled with transportation and other costs, single-use bottles account for nearly 49 million barrels of wasted oil per year, enough to fuel three-million U.S. cars for a year.

“We sincerely hope Suffolk County Water Authority customers will realize the devastating effect that the manufacture, transport and disposal of bottled water has on our environment, and take advantage of these reusable water bottles to help them make the switch to drinking tap,” said Stephen Jones, CEO of Suffolk County Water Authority. “Our non-leaching, reusable bottles are made entirely in New York State with post-industrial recycled plastic, therefore decreasing the amount of oil and carbon that would have been used to manufacture them and transport them from another state.”

Prior to the Suffolk County Water Authority joining this campaign, Tap Into The City launched the NYC H2O Sports Bottle in December 2007, encouraging residents and visitors to choose New York City tap water over bottled water. At that time, Brooklyn Borough President, Marty Markowitz said, “It’s a brilliant idea whose time has not only come – but is long overdue!” Other municipalities nationwide will be adopting similar programs in coming months.

“Thanks to the local water authorities and the municipalities that maintain our infrastructure and protect our source water, U.S. tap water is among the world’s best. We are now aware that the choices we make today have an irreversible impact on the environment tomorrow. By returning to the tap, and by using safe, recycled bottles, we can kick our bottled water habit,” concluded McKelvey.

About Tap into the City
Tap Into The City was founded in 2007 to promote tap water and raise awareness about the environmental impact of consuming bottled water. Tap Into The City customizes bottles for companies and organizations seeking to promote the public benefits of tap water to their employees, constituents or customers. As a full-service company, Tap Into The City designs and produces sports bottles and other promotional materials supporting tap water campaigns across the country. The company also offers the NYC H2O Sports Bottle, made from safe, non-leaching, recycled HDPE plastic as an alternative to buying bottled water. To get more information or to purchase an NYC H2O Sports Bottle, visit www.tapintothecity.com.


Drink NYC H2O. Straight from the tap.

New Report Confirms potential danger in Poly Carbonate bottles

What do you do when one arm of the government says everything is O.K. and another tells you to watch out? That is what is happening with bisphenol-A — a chemical used in many plastics and epoxy resins now found in baby bottles and liners for canned goods. The answer is a truism in every family rulebook — when in doubt, especially when it comes to children, err on the side of caution. That means it is a good idea to keep the young away from bisphenol-A, or BPA.

See the whole article: That Plastic Baby Bottle

Bottles, Bottles Everywhere, Amid the Drops You Drink

New York City is campaigning to stop bottled water consumption in favor of good old tap water. But we, as New Yorkers have to do our part as well. Read the latest blog post from the New York Times' City Room:

Bottles, Bottles Everywhere, Amid the Drops You Drink

City Council Shuns Bottles in Favor of Water From Tap

From the New York Times, June 17th, 2008

Last week, the speaker’s office announced that it would stop buying bottled water for the Council’s downtown offices, which went through at least 6,000 single-serving bottles last year. As a result, bottled water will no longer be available at City Council events or official functions.

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Bottlemania: Great New Book on Bottled Water

Check out this new book on bottled water: BOTTLEMANIA: How Water Went on Sale and Why We Bought It, by Elizabeth Royte. Read about it in the New York Times Sunday Book Review:

Tapped Out

To paraphrase an old axiom: You don’t buy water, you only rent it. So why did Americans spend nearly $11 billion on bottled water in 2006, when we could have guzzled tap water at up to about one ten-thousandth the cost? The facile answer is marketing, marketing and more marketing, but Elizabeth Royte goes much deeper into the drink in “Bottlemania: How Water Went on Sale and Why We Bought It,” streaming trends cultural, economic, political and hydrological into an engaging investigation of an unexpectedly murky substance. Partway through her undoctrinaire book, Royte, a lifelong fan of tap water, refills her old plastic water bottle, reflecting that “what once seemed so simple and natural, a drink of water, is neither. All my preconceptions about this most basic of beverages have been queered.” And by the end of the book she will have discarded the old plastic bottle too, but not the tap.

The World's Largest Garbage Dump Floating to a City Near You

A friend recently emailed me an article that everyone must read. It's truly shocking! 

About 500 miles off the coast of California there is a floating island of debris that stretches past Hawaii and almost as far as Japan. 

"A "plastic soup: of waste is floating in the Pacific Ocean is growing at an alarming rate and now covers an area twice the size of the continental United States, scientists have said."

If you need more incentive to stop buying bottled water, please read this NOW:

The World's rubbish dump: a garbage tip that stretches from Hawaii to Japan

Where is Poland Spring Anyway?

Many people think bottled water is somehow safer and better tasting than tap water. While we in New York City know we have some of the safest and best tasting tap water in the world, most people don't realize that bottled water companies don't have access to "secret sources" of water. Most water sources are shared by municipalities and manufacturers.

Poland Springs is no exception. If you think Poland Springs water comes from some pristine spring in the mountains far away from human interference, think again. In 2003, Poland Spring was sued for false advertising for charging extra for water that supposedly comes from springs, but in fact is heavily treated common ground water. 

In Frybeburg, Maine, Poland Spring actually buys water from another company, then ships it to the Poland Spring bottling plant in Poland Spring. 

Check out this article on Think Outside the Bottle's website: Nestle's Abuses in Fryeburg, Maine.