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 Americans use and disposal of plastic water bottles (50 billion) would have every person using 167 single-use plastic water bottles each year. Americans spend over $15 billion dollars each year on bottled water. Aquafina (Pepsi) and Dasani (Coke) sell 24% of all US bottled water. Yet, both are merely treated municipal tap water, resold to the public at a premium mark-up. The three largest corporations holding bottled water companies dominate the market. Pepsi has 13% of the market and Coke has 11%. Both of which resell treated tap water. Nestlé holds a number of smaller brands but collectively they make it the largest bottled water corporation with 26% of the market. This makes up half the US bottled water market. World-wide the bottled water market is $50 billion dollars. The country which consumes the most bottled water also has the most publically accessible and safest water sources- the United States. The next three largest consuming countries of bottled water do not have reliable tap water- China, Brazil, and Mexico. San Francisco's tap water comes from Yosemite National Park and is so pure the EPA does not require it to be filtered. A bottled of Evian water at $1.35 could be refilled with San Francisco tap water once a day for over ten years before the cost would total $1.35. If tap water cost the same as the cheapest bottled, monthly water bills would come to $9,000. It is estimated that at a cost of $1.29 a water bottle, that half goes to the retailer leaving 65¢. 43¢ goes to transportation and distribution leaving 22¢. 12¢ is taken for the water, bottle, and cap. Leaving a dime for profit. But don't feel bad for Coke or Pepsi, both of which sell at least 3.36 billion bottles of water each year. Multiple all those bottles by that dime profit and each company makes at least $336,000,000 a year. One billion dollars worth of plastic water bottles goes into landfills and litter each year. Although bottled water is no better (healthier) than tap water, bottles water can cost 4,000-10,000 times what tap does for the same amount. Bottled water can cost as much $10 per gallon, making gasoline cost less than bottle water. Americans spend more than $15 billion dollars annually on bottled water, buying 2.6 billion cases. Impact 30 billion plastic water bottles are thrown away every year. Plastic can take up to a thousand years to disintegrate and make up a big deposit of plastic toxic waste in the Pacific Ocean. Feeding the bottled water industry has taken a toll on wells from homes in rural communities by draining aquifers, lowered lake levels, and hurt wetlands. It takes three times as much water than it is produced. One twenty ounce bottle of water takes sixty ounces of water to produce. One years' figures (2006)- to package and bottle eight billion gallons of water took 900,000 tons of plastic. Making bottles of water out of plastic takes more than 1.5 million barrels of oil, every year. That much oil could fuel 100,000 American cars for a year. Eight-six percent of single-use plastic water bottles become landfill or litter in the US. The plastic water bottle manufacturers with all their products generate greater than 2.5 million tons of carbon dioxide each year. They also require seventeen million barrels of oil each year. Consumption Americans drink more than 28 gallons of water per capita annually. In 1976 bottle water consumption was 1.6 gallons per person. Americans drink less milk, coffee, or beer than they do bottled water. They only consume carbonated soft drinks more bottled water. Soft drink consumption is at an annual per capita rate of 52.9 gallons. 66 million water bottles will go into the garbage or litter today. Global demand of bottled water increased 100% from 1999 to 2004 at 41 billion gallons consumed annually. America with the world's best and most prolific consumable tap water is also the world's largest consumer of bottled water (at 7 billion gallons). Following is Mexico, China, and Brazil. Globally 2.7 million tons of water bottle plastic is used annually. Each week 1 billion bottles of water is transported in the US. That's equals 37,800 semi-trucks hauling water every week. Bottled Water - Tap Water Coke (Dasani) and Pepsi (Aquafina) take tap and put it through an energy intensive process called reverse-osmosis. This process takes more energy than turning seawater into drinking water. Additional filtration is not needed for tap water but used only for marketing (to say they did something worthy of charging a premium) and to assure a consistent taste across all regions, municipal sources, and bottlers. Bottled water companies squashed "right to know" reports for their water, a requirement that municipal water systems must release to show what is in their water. Near 70% of bottled water that is bottled and sold within state lines is unregulated, This state line jurisdiction means the Food & Drug Administration (FDA) does not supervise its purity or safety, only state law and state inspectors regulate. Bottled water if it does fall under FDA jurisdiction is still much more lax than the stringent Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) requirements that municipal waters are required to follow. Chemical Most water bottles are made of polyethylene terephthalate (PET) plastic at 12 to 30 grams of molded plastic each. Recycling of PET is about 23%, meaning Americans throw-away 38 billion bottles a year. Nestlé Waters will produce 18 billion bottles of water and now has its half-liter bottle using 20% less plastic. Which is also a good financial move for the company, less material, production, transportation costs. PET is made from crude oil. PET bottles produce toxic emissions at rates of 100 times that of glass. Consumer Reports found 80% of five gallon water containers they looked into in 2000 had the endocrine disrupter, bisphenol A, residue in the water. Bisphenol A, even in extremely low doses has links to cancers, diabetes, reproductive problems, and problematic neurological development. Age and heat increases the plastics in bottled water to leach chemicals, this causes more problems with storage and transportation. However, no problems have been found with aluminum lined, baked enamel lined, or refillable stainless steel containers. It will take 400 to 1,000 years for plastic to degrade in the environment. |
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