We are all guilty of drinking bottled water, but many of us don’t even know that it’s something we should feel bad about. In fact, drinking water from a bottle has almost become a way of life. People often don’t trust tap water because they think it isn’t as safe as bottled water. Some people won’t drink water from the tap because they don’t like how it tastes.
There isn’t much truth to the idea that people don’t like tap water. But as per the Safe Water Drinking Act, almost all tap water in public places is safe to drink and tastes great. Still, a cold-water bottle is sometimes just too tempting to pass up. But it turns out there are many good reasons not to give in and many more reasons to consider not buying bottled water.
How is it possible for a sealed bottle of water to get contaminated? Isn’t water sold in plastic bottles safe for drinking? There have been reports of more than one hundred cases of bottled water being recalled. Algae, bacteria, and chlorine are a few major water pollutants that usually contaminate bottled water. Things like glass fragments and mold were identified in bottled water in Texas in 1994.
Bottled water sold within a single state cannot be regulated by the FDA, even though the FDA does have some standards. Yet you have to search for the truth extensively if you want to know whether the bottled water you’re buying is safe or not. Compared to bottled water, typical city water is better regulated.
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You may have noticed that when you leave a plastic water bottle out in the sun, it gets softer. If there is enough heat, the plastic can melt all the way. Also, bottled water can sometimes taste a little bit like plastic, which is not coincidental. In fact, chemicals in plastic products can leak into the contents and make them unsafe to drink.
BPA, an industrial chemical found in plastics that acts as a hormone and can change how a baby’s brain grows and develops, is the main cause of chemicals leaking into the water. Even plastics that say they don’t contain BPA often test positive for other harmful chemicals.
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Tap water has to meet a lot of rules, but bottled water doesn’t have to. Since they aren’t regulated, they can be less safe and more likely to have harmful things in them than water from the tap. People think bottled water is “pure,” but this is an illusion. Actually, you don’t know how well the water was purified.
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Even though tap water isn’t technically free, it’s pretty close, especially when compared to how much bottled water costs. Look at it this way: every month, no matter what, you have to pay your water bill. If you drink tap water, it only adds a small amount to your bill. It costs a lot more to buy water in a bottle.
Food & Water Watch says that the price of a gallon of bottled water can range from 89 cents to $8.26. A gallon of tap water, on the other hand, costs less than a penny. This means that bottled water costs thousand times as much as tap water. So why pay for something that you can get for almost nothing?
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People seem to be worried about tap water quality, so they choose to drink bottled water instead. But this idea that bottled water is better for your health is completely false. The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) says that a four-year review of the water industry’s safety found no proof that bottled water is in any way better. In other words, there is no reason at all to buy a $3 bottle of designer water. Just drink what comes out of the tap!
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Even without water, bottles are still bad for humans and harmful to the world. The Pacific Institute says that producing many plastic bottles uses more than 17 million barrels of oil every year. That is a waste of many resources that can’t be replaced. Does it make sense to use all of the non-replenishable gasoline to make plastic bottles?
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Like almost everything else in the world, plastic is made with a lot of water. It might seem counterintuitive, but making water bottles takes a lot of water. In fact, you need much more than what the bottle can hold. It could take the water from six or seven bottles to make a single container. You could just get a glass from the tap instead.
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The process of making water bottles is just the beginning of how they hurt the environment. The Water Project says that over 2 million tons of PET plastic water bottles are being thrown away in the United States alone. The commonly used thin, transparent plastic bottles are made of a type of plastic called PET.
PET bottles can be recycled, which is good, but only one out of every five bottles makes it to the recycling bin. The rest just take up space and pollute the precious planet. A plastic bottle doesn’t break down for 450 years, which is a very long time.
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Before it comes out of your taps, city water goes through a lot of tests. The Safe Drinking Water Act gives the EPA the job of ensuring your tap water is clean and safe to drink. In some cities, the water must be tested as many as 100 times a month.
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Commercials for bottled water make us think that the water comes from heavenly springs that are full of all kinds of good things. In reality, though, it looks a lot more like a factory. Up to 25% of the bottled water on the market is just filled with tap water and then sealed.
Words like “purified” or “drinking water” make people think that the water in a bottle came from an oasis, but it’s really just water from the tap. This is done by a lot of the most popular and cheapest brands.
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