Just came across these stats about our bottled water habit. In 2005, Americanas spent more than $16 BILLION on bottled water. We know that in many cases (like Aquafina, which I have to admit is my bottled water of choice if I am at an airport or something) bottled water is just good ole’ tap water that is filtered then bottled for a serious mark-up. There are certainly places where we’re trapped and have to buy bottled water, but, given the choice, eliminating our bottled water addiction (but not our drinking water habit which is way good for you!) would be good for our checkbooks and the environment. It takes more than 1.5 million barrels of oil a year to make the bottles Americans use for water consumption and only 15% are recycled (this really surprised me). And with some waters coming from other countries to the US for consumption, we’re racking up more than 4,000 tons of carbon dioxide emissions each year related to bottled water. Let’s think about investing in a water filtration system at home and water bottles that we can reuse, and let’s make sure we always recycle the bottles from any bottled water that we buy.
