H2O RLY · posted 30 October 07 under
water, hygiene
The more I read about bottled water, the more I’m starting to find its popularity offensive. Here are my major gripes, in no particular order:
- it’s expensive. Bottled water costs between 240 to 1,000 times on average what tap water does—more than orange juice, delicious farm-pasteurized chocolate milk, or even gasoline. If that isn’t enough to elicit a hearty wtf, I don’t know what is.
- it’s wasteful. Even if you recycle the bottles, it takes a lot of energy to bring them to your grocery store. Half the time, it’s someone else’s tap water you’re paying for, and the rest of the time you’re sponsoring the exploitation of natural water sources that can be compromised as a result.
- it’s not better for you. Aside from missing out on the flouride and other minerals present in tap water (though you may boost your arsenic intake, if that’s what you’re going for), bottled water is generally held to a lower standard than tap. And about the flouride, filters are available for that if you have reason to avoid it.
I don’t think that people should never drink bottled water, but really, it’s a convenience product. I love love love my Brita pitcher, and I would imagine that any of the similar products out there would give it a run for its money. I have also tried the faucet apparatus, but I like that one much less because the water isn’t as cold and thus requires ice, which is made by my freezer with tap water. I know I have other ice options, but living alone, I don’t go through a lot of it, so having fresh delicious ice available for my tap-purified water adds an extra layer of complexity to my life that I don’t need.
This is hardly an exhaustive list of all the things that can be done, but it’s a good place to start. Takeaways: bottled water = bad. Brita filtered water in a nice glass feels more decadent than drinking out of a crunchy plastic bottle anyway. if you need something more portable, try a delicious Nalgene or one of these trendy stainless steel versions that claim to be safer than plastic bottles.
