Tuesday, June 10, 2008

Do you buy plastic water bottles?

Yes, I am going to proselytize for a moment. Forgive me, but are you one of the many Americans that drinks bottled water? Do you buy it in the new "Eco friendly" plastic bottles so cleverly (and uber-annoyingly) created by Poland Spring? They are NOT Eco-friendly. There is nothing Eco friendly about water that comes in plastic bottles. The reason I am bringing this up is today I watched a woman change the trash on the train platform and three empty "Eco friendly" bottles of Poland Spring crashed to the floor as she pulled the bag from the trash can. Plastic that is not recycled is NOT at all Eco-friendly. Just because they say it is 100% recyclable does not make you, the consumer, actually recycle it. Recyclable is not the same as biodegradable, folks! If it ends up in the trash it will possibly take hundreds of years to biodegrade. Look at the interesting statistics here if I haven't made you feel horrible enough for buying plastic water bottles and then throwing them in the trash. Poland Spring touts this bottle as Eco-friendly because it is made with 30% less plastic. Basically that makes the bottle lighter and therefore cheaper for them to ship- its true positive impact on the world is negligible, but it's monetary benefit to the company is huge (not to mention the fact that they somehow convinced us all it's okay to pay for drinking water). And one final point: We live in a country where tap water is good and plentiful. Why are you wasting your money on bottled water when it comes to your house for free or for a relatively low cost? Buy a water filter, attach it to your sink, put $1-$2 in a cookie jar every time you get a glass of water and watch the savings grow (by the way- reuse the same water glass all day!). And on top of that for those times that you are traveling, walking, or otherwise out of the house and jonesing for some H2O, go to www.mysigg.com and buy yourself a cool aluminum water bottle (Check out the benefits of non plastic here). Okay, now that that's out- I feel better!

3 comments:

Marie said...

not anymore :) although i really wish i wouldn't have used my old nalgene bottle when i was preggo with lily...drinking bottle after bottle after bottle. THOUGHT i was doing a good thing...

Jim-the Classical Liberal (Views from the Right) said...

Buy a good canteen from a Army/Navy surplus store! GO JODI!!

Cassie said...

You get up on that podium Jodi and shout. Shout out loud. I'm listening!!!!!!! I love you. Run for governor!