January 2009
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FacebookBy Margaret Chandler
In the first of this series, I wrote about water withdrawals and their impact on local watersheds, water pricing and some of the recent successes of the anti-bottled-water activists. In this article, I will discuss the energy, waste, and health considerations.
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Water is the best of all things. Pindar, circa 500 BC
Two and half thousand years later and not much has changed. We can still concur with an ancient Greek’s pithy observation. But when it comes to bottling the “best of all things” into single-serve plastic containers, aphorisms fail us. Instead, we are left with a host of questions that need answering. How much energy goes into the bottling of water? What happens to those billions of water bottles that we discard every year? Does this energy and waste footprint pay off for us in any health benefits?
The answer to the first of these questions is troubling. The Earth Policy Institute, founded by one of the most influential thinkers in the environmental movement – Lester Brown, estimates that in 2007 the equivalent of more than 17 million barrels of oil were used producing water bottles for consumption in the United States. That’s enough oil to fuel more than one million cars for a year. And it’s carbon costly too – generating more than 2.5 million tonnes of CO2.
That’s just the energy to manufacture the packaging, the bottling, and the cap. It doesn’t consider the journey from bottling plant to consumer. Obviously, drinking water bottled in Fiji and shipped here rather than drinking tap water, which relies on a regional infrastructure of underground pipes and plumbing, is not going to win you any points in the eat local debate. And bottled water is an international jetsetter. The French brands Evian and Volvic, for example, export close to 60% of their water to destinations across the globe.
Another part of the energy equation is the fact bottled water is often shipped cold and stored cold. And all that refrigeration demands considerable energy. That harmless looking product on the grocery shelf has proven to be quite the energy hog by the time it reaches the till.
All that energy has to go somewhere, and the best we can hope for is that after the bottle’s short lifespan, it doesn’t end up in a landfill. In Alberta, we have good recovery rates for our plastic beverage containers. In 2008, the Alberta Beverage Container Recycling Corporation recovered 69% of single serving plastic beverage containers. There’s even a local company that takes the bottles, flakes them, and ships them off to be re-manufactured into non-food items.
But these recovery stats aren’t as good across the country. According to the Environment and Plastic Industry Council, about 125,000 tonnes of plastic beverage bottles were generated in Canada in 2002 (and it’s important to remember that the industry uses virgin plastic for the bottles). About 48% of these 125,000 tonnes were recovered and recycled.
In the US the statistics are more grim: the Container Recycling Institute in California says nine out of 10 plastic water bottles end up as garbage and litter. Little wonder that a gargantuan island of plastic – estimated to be about the size of Quebec – lingers 900 kilometres off the California coast.
Better systems would improve these recovery rates, but systems are not the solution. Christina Seidel, the executive director of the Recycling Council of Alberta, is delighted that the issue of plastic waste has been getting so much attention. “But it’s missing the point if we focus on the recycling,” she says. “The real issue is that we shouldn’t be purchasing single-use plastic containers in the first place.” Seidel urges people to remember that they’re doing the best thing for the environment when they focus on moving up the waste hierarchy.
The good news is that our love affair with bottled water has already peaked. Bottled water is rapidly becoming the Hummer of the drink world. The groundswell of opposition has enabled municipalities and others to ban the bottle. In Calgary, we’re lagging behind other municipalities and post-secondary institutions. But if we join with others across the country, we can help staunch the flow of bottled water and return to what makes the best environmental and economic sense: tap water.
So are the health benefits worth the energy to generate, transport, store, recycle, and recover all this plastic?
Most of the bottled water we drink is sold in polyethylene terephthalate (PET) bottles, and the jury is out on whether there’s a risk of leaching and bacterial growth. In 2006, Dr. William Shotyk, the Canadian director of the Institute of Environmental Geochemistry at the University of Heidelberg, released a study of bottled water in PET bottles and found significant levels of antimony, a potentially toxic heavy metal. The longer the water stays in the bottle, the higher the level of antimony. Although antimony was found in concentrations well below the guidelines generally recommended for drinking water, Shotyk maintains that the continuous release from these containers is “bothersome.”
As far as the actual water itself, the industry maintains that bottled water is cleaner and more rigorously tested than tap water. However, Health Canada maintains there is no evidence that bottled water is any safer than tap water. And according to CBC, local water supplies are inspected every day while bottled-water plants are inspected just once every three years. Most city water systems test for coliform bacteria several times a day. Bottling plants are required to perform that test only once a week.
In Calgary, our tap water meets or exceeds provincial and federal drinking standards, “The City is investing hundreds of millions in the drinking water treatment facilities to ensure we stay ahead of growth and new regulatory requirements,” explains Paul Fesko, manager of Strategic Services for The City of Calgary, Water Resources.
Obviously these exemplary standards do not apply worldwide; over one billion people do not have a secure and clean supply of drinking water. Bottled water, however, is not the answer.
When I was in Mexico recently, I drank bottled water, as did mostly everyone. (Mexico now has the second highest bottled water consumption rate in the world; only the U.S. is higher.) But this is a wastefully extravagant stopgap measure at best. The true solution is to ensure that existing water treatment and sanitation systems are improved and expanded. Otherwise, we’ll soon be making horror movies about those floating islands of plastic.
None of the bottle’s life-cycle, from its manufacturing to its shipping and storage to its final recycling and recovery, sounds either energy efficient or environmentally sound. In fact, it sounds like a disaster.
Whatever angle you take – be it price, energy, health, or waste – there doesn’t seem to be any justification for not drinking tap water and using a stainless steel container for when you’re away from home. “At the end of the day, the bottled water folks can spin the bottle all they want,” says Joe Cressy, campaign coordinator with the Polaris Institute, “but there is no environmental solution or rationale for drinking bottled water.”
| Bottled Water Quick Facts |
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| In 2005, Canadians consumed about two billion litres of bottled water – about 60 litres per person. |
| About twice as much water is used in the production process as the volume of water sold. |
| Visualize your water bottle filled 1/4 of the way up with oil. That’s how much oil it took to produce the bottle. |
| Some 2.5 million tonnes of plastic are used worldwide to bottle water each year. |
| The U.N. estimates it would cost about $30 billion to provide everyone with clean drinking water. Last year, $100 billion was spent worldwide on bottled water. |
| Almost 3 in 10 Canadian households used bottled water as their main source of drinking water in the home in 2006. |
TAKE ACTION:
- Pick up a reusable stainless steel water bottle and stop the madness. Otter Bottle Incorporated is a Calgary company that is promoting a plastic free world for your health and the environment. Local retailers include Community Natural Foods, Green Plan-It, Riva’s The Eco Store, and SwizzleSticks SalonSpa. For retailers across the country visit www.otterbottle.ca.
- For more information on the health and environmental hazards associated with plastic visit www.lifewithoutplastic.com.
- Visit the website for the Recycling Council of Alberta – a non-profit association whose mission is to promote and facilitate waste reduction, recycling, and resource conservation in Alberta – for information on recycling and links to other organizations working on this issue.
- For more information about the conservation of watersheds in Alberta visit www.water-matters.org.
- Visit www.insidethebottle.org, an initiative of the Polaris Institute to stimulate citizen awareness of the bottled water industry, where you will find lots of information and campaign tools to put a stop to bottled water consumption.
- The next time you choose a reusable water bottle or reduce your consumption of bottled water, track your actions to see the difference your choices are making.
- Stay tuned for the final article in our series where Margaret examines the underlying causes of the phenomenal success of the bottled water industry, the lure of convenience, and the opportunities for behavioural changes.
January 31st, 2009 at 4:56 pm
I practise as much conservation as possible. I don’t use bottled water, not even when I’m running my tour company. We have to make the bottle companies pay more for using our resource. Cocacola and Pepsi basically just use our tap water and put it through an osmosis process…and pay very little for the privilege.
February 1st, 2009 at 11:47 am
Great Article, well written well researched. I will be disscussing this with my students next week.
Brian
February 15th, 2009 at 10:00 pm
water powered cars…
I learned something here. Thanks for posting….
February 10th, 2010 at 11:29 pm
Great article! I am going to reference people to it! I work for Culligan Water. I specialize in the BOTTLE-LESS products. Point of Use systems for your home or office.
$30-80/month offers unlimited bottled water quality. It’s like have a mini water plant inside your home. Call me if you want more information. Josh 403-467-5637