Free Filtered Water For Reusable Bottle Users - The Trend Grows

by A.K. Streeter

From: http://www.treehugger.com/

Photo A. Streeter via flickr and Creative Commons.

Certain places hold us captive to buying bottled water - which if you've seen the documentary Tapped you'll likely not want to do. Airports are generally the worst - if you unthinkingly purchase bottles in the terminal before passing through security, your very expensive water will basically go staight into the trash. Adding a reusable bottle to the things we all cart around sometimes feels like a drag, but hopefully a new trend makes schlepping the reusable Kleen Kanteen or other stainless or glass bottle much more rewarding.

The Chicago Department of Aviation has installed filtered water stations especially designed for reusable bottles at both O'Hare (Terminal 2) and Chicago Midway airports. Not only is this a boon to those of us with reusable bottles and a real aversion to buying bottled water. It's also saving CO2 emissions. Yes, a drop in the proverbial bucket, but a start in turning back the massive tide of bottled water that is so damaging to our environment and so unnecessary.

At both the airports, there's a Liquid Disposal Station before security lines, and refill stations are located right next to the regular drinking fountains (a big plus, as it is quite difficult to refill bottles at the regular fountains).

You simply set your bottle onto the station's metal tray and refill happens hands free.

The Dept. of Aviation estimates the water stations, installed after Earth Day 2010, will save approximately 17,000 pounds of greenhouse gases from being emitted, and 29 fewer tons of trash from going to landfill annually.

In San Francisco, Virgin Airways is sponsoring a similar filtered water refill station.

Washingtonians are also lucky - the TapIt initiative means there are more than 60 spots in the city, (participating businesses) that will allow you to fill your reusable bottle for free.

Reviewing some of the highlights from the documentary for your water edification:

- A large amount of the water you are buying in bottled water comes from the same sources as tap water.

- Bottled water is more than a $10 billion annual business, with the biggest corporate players being Coca-Cola, Pepsico, and Nestle.

- Approximately 18 million barrels of oil are used each year to transport water for bottled water consumption.

-Eliminating or minimizing bottled water usage would be a huge boon for the ocean where lots of plastic ends up circling endlessly in loops like the Pacific Gyre.


-Storing water in plastic is a very risky business, as toxic chemicals have been shown to leach from the plastic in to the water, especially over time (including bisphenol-A).

And, most relevant for consumers, bottled water costs from 240 to over 10,000 times more per gallon to purchase than tap water (NRDC source).

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Madonna is Crazy for Coconut Water

By MERCEDES CARDONA

Madonna is coming soon to your neighborhood bodega: The Material Girl has become a major investor in a company that sells coconut water in supermarkets.

Madonna's manager, Guy Oseary, told The New York Post that the singer invested about $1.5 million in Vita Coco, a New York-based company that sells the beverage in New York and Los Angeles and wants to take its product national. Oseary also told The Post he's convinced other celebrities, including actor Matthew McConaughey and singer Anthony Kiedis of the Red Hot Chili Peppers, to make smaller investments in the company.

Apparently, Madonna liked the juice of green coconuts so much, she's throwing marketing ideas to the Vita Coco management, and is talking about making a follow-up investment, according to The Post.

Coconut water has been gaining trendiness over the last couple of years, moving out of inner-city bodegas, where its main audience had been immigrants from the Caribbean and Latin America, and into the realm of hipster chic. With Madonna's seal of approval, it could go mainstream.

The market could be ripe for growth -- no pun intended. Several companies are already promoting coconut water as both a healthy substitute for sports drinks and a trendy mixer for cocktails. Vita Coco has reportedly turned down overtures from both Pepsico (PEP), which already owns two brands of coconut water in Brazil, and Coca-Cola Co. (KO). A rival coconut water brand, Zico, last year sold a minority stake to Coca-Cola, and another brand, O.N.E., signed a distribution agreement with Pepsi.

Lucky Stars? In High-Profile Investments, Not Always

But keep in mind, celebrity investors are not the same thing as investment celebrities. Madonna is nothing like Warren Buffett.

Any number of celebrities have put their money and fame behind various ventures -- U2 frontman Bono co-founded Elevation Partners, a Silicon Valley tech fund, and Bruce WIllis just signed up as an investor in distiller Belvedere SA -- but a having celebrities attached to your business is no guarantee of success. The company has to live and die by its own product.

Remember Planet Hollywood? The chain of restaurants was supposed to take on the Hard Rock Cafe, and it was a natural fit for movie stars like Willis, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sylvester Stallone. For a while, it was flying high, and spawned imitators like the Fashion Cafe (models) and the All-Star Cafe (famous jocks). Then it overreached, opened too many restaurants and ended up with a trip to bankruptcy court, followed by a couple of sequels. Star power turned out to be no substitute for prudent management.

The investors apparently learned their lesson -- except perhaps for Arnold, who's trying to bail out California. Willis got a 3.3% stake in Belvedere in exchange for promoting its vodka, and his ex-wife Demi Moore -- another former Planet Hollywood investor -- made a smaller investment in Vita Coco than Madonna. Even stars sometimes have to start small.

The 5 Cleanest (and Dirtiest) U.S. Tap Waters - Infographic

Click Image above to Enlarge...

awesome.good.is —
Even though water comes out of the faucet looking clean and clear, there is a good chance it has some pretty nasty stuff in it. A new study has cataloged all the pollutants and chemicals that appear in our tap water, and they include things like arsenic and fuel additives. This is a look at the five most and least polluted water systems in America

Spin on the Bottle: Water Packaging Gets Creative

BY Ariel Schwartz

Bottled water companies have been struggling with a backlash against their products because of energy and health concerns, but they're not going away. At least the innovation these days seems to be focused on improving the impact bottled water has on the environment rather than merely in its marketing claims. PepsiCo's Aquafina brand announced the launch yesterday of the Eco-Fina bottle, made with 50% less plastic than normal Aquafina bottles. The new bottle, scheduled to begin shipping in April, will save an estimated 75 million pounds of plastic each year. Aquafina also plans on removing cardboard base pads from 24-packs--a move that will save 20 million pounds of corrugated cardboard each year.

Startups are getting in on the act as well. A company called Boxed Water is Better is producing, as the name implies, boxed water. BWAB ships unfilled recylable containers to the water source in an attempt to keep pollution level low, and it donates 20% of all profits to world water relief and tree reforestation organizations.

Just today, Plant It Water debuted packaging made from over 60% renewable materials. The company also says it will plant a tree for every carton of water sold. (That's maybe not as fun as planting a tree for every vodka bottle sold, but it is easier--and healthier--to make a positive impact with heavy consumption.)

Of course, for the residents of most U.S. cities, drinking clean tap water is still the way to go. But if you have to drink bottled water, better to support the brands making an effort to be more sustainable. Some change is better than no change at all.

[Via Trading Markets]