The Tulsa Forum by TulsaNow

Here is an editorial from today's Tulsa World. She quotes me accurately and portays me the right amount of zealot as well.

http://www.tulsaworld.com/opinion/article.aspx?articleID=070630_7_G1_spanc24764

Battling the bottle: City's efforts to go green should include targeting water bottles

By JULIE DELCOUR Associate Editor
7/1/2007

The carpeting at the Metropolitan Environmental Trust is made out of recycled water bottles. Ask MET Executive Director Michael Patton how friendly plastic water bottles are to the environment and he might start pacing around on that carpet, spouting facts and figures, seeing red while thinking green. Use of plastic water bottles (PWBs)is one of the world's most wasteful habits.

Nationally, nine out of 10 PWBs end up in the trash. Americans spend almost $11,000 a minute quenching their thirst on from bottled water. Sales worldwide are $35 billion. Five years ago six billion bottles were sold in the U.S. That figure has risen six percent every year since.

Patton applauds San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom's ban last week on the purchase of PWBs with city funds. Each month, the MET collects six tons of polyethylene terephthalate (PET) bottles curbside and nine tons from collection bins. That's about one and a half pounds per household from the 20,000 households that recycle. About 30 percent of PET collections are water bottles -- 160,000 bottles per month. (Most others are soda bottles.) "Our 30 percent number means that the average family would generate about 225 plastic water bottles per year," Patton said, "and only about 16 of those bottles get recycled."

Most plastic water bottles aren't reincarnated as carpeting, fake lumber or flower pots. They go to die in landfills, where they will live almost forever. It takes a 1,000 years for one to biodegrade. Even the best recycling efforts are failing to keep pace with all that waste, and the environmental consequences are enormous. In San Francisco, city leaders decided they needed to do something. Newsom's ban is but the latest step to encourage environmental action among citizens. A lot of cities, including Tulsa, could follow the example.

While Mayor Kathy Taylor has not issued any orders on plastic water bottles, she is a fan of recycling. The city has a long list of green goals departments are urged to follow: Decrease energy consumption by turning off lights in empty rooms, shutting down computers after work and carpooling or riding the bus. Those who drive city vehicles must observe a no-idling policy. City departments are being asked to decrease fuel consumption by 10 percent. The city uses energy-efficient light bulbs and some biodiesel fuels. Tulsa also is a member of the Blue Skyways Collaborative, which focuses on improving air quality in the central U.S. Tulsa has pledged to adopt voluntary measures, using innovative programs, to reduce emissions. Even the proposed purchase of a new city hall site has a greenish tint. Unlike the aging City Hall, the gleaming One Technology Center, 100 S. Cincinnati Ave., is among Tulsa's most energy efficient buildings. The city has projects to recycle medicines and thermometers containing mercury, which help safeguard water supplies.

The city could take another step by encouraging employees and all Tulsans to drink more filtered or unfiltered tap water. Government, a major employer and user of materials, should set the right tone. "Reduce, reuse and recyle is the right order," Patton said. "We should reduce our consumption of bottles by investing in home filters including the inexpensive water pitcher filters. If we use bottles we should refill them. One-time use is not enough. Then, we should recycle bottles. They're too valuable to be in the trash."

About 18 million barrels of oil a year goes into manufacture of plastic bottles -- equivalent to the energy use in 1.1 million homes or the fueling of hundreds of thousands of vehicles. The waste does not stop there. Transporting bottles from afar or even from one point in the U.S. to another, is costly. The water bottle problem could be remedied fairly quickly if consumers were willing to return to tap water or filtered tap water, which is well regulated. Bottled waters have been called the "nectar of the frauds." But there's little evidence to suggest these spring, mineral, purified, distilled, carbonated, oxygenated, caffeinated and vitamin-enriched waters are any better for consumers than tap water, says E magazine. Nearly half of bottled waters are made from tap water anyway. Alaska Premium Glacier Drinking Water, coming from "the last unpolluted frontier," actually came from Public Water System #111241 in Juneau.

"Americans are throwing away 53 million water bottles a day. Eleven-thousand cubic yards of landfill space gone, just for empty bottles, each of which could have been re-used or avoided in the first place." Patton said. "Water is the most abundant natural resource on the planet and is now packaged and transported by using a non-renewable resource. Landfills are constant reminders to our children of our failures as a society. We failed to buy the right amount, failed to choose durable over convenience or cost, and failed to reuse or recycle."

Do we care? Apparently not much. Consider this calculation by Patton: A 16-ounce bottle of water costs a buck. It would cost $8 a gallon or $8,000 for a thousand gallons. The city of Tulsa sells water for $2.17 for 1,000 gallons, delivered. With sales tax, bottled water costs almost exactly 4,000 times more than tap water in Tulsa. "People who buy bottled water overspend, waste precious resources and contribute to mountains of garbage." That's his message in a bottle.

Big gulp.

"People who buy bottled water overspend, waste precious resources and contribute to mountains of garbage." That's his message in a bottle.

Big gulp.

[/quote]

I used to buy bottled water until an earlier discussion on another post re: the amount of trash these bottles produce changed my mind.
I thought that since I "recycled", it was ok. I never thought of the amount of trash I was throwing out every week.
Now, I'm drinking from my Pur water pitcher.. no more plastic bottles for me.
Thanks RCM!

Those bottles create a mountain of trash at each Road Race we produce.  With over 2,000 people there for three to four days, the amount of refuse left at the facilites is tremendous.  

In days go by there were deposits charged on glass bottles, which the stores or recycle centers paid when those were retuened.  In today's world the economy seems so sketchy that there are no set values on much of any used products.  So the value of the recycle plastic seems to vary from day to day, thus making it next to impossible to set a standard deposit fee/return number on the bottles.  Or is that possible?

I challenge the 1,000 year theory of the time anything made from plastic will last.  Don't recall those vinyl tops on cars lasting 1,000 years, or the upholstery or plastic parts on the Belvedere standing up to the 50 years in the hole.  Outdoors in the sunlight plastic seems to last even a shorter time span.  If it were 1,000 years, why don't we make roofing materials from this type of plastic, shingles seem to only have a 30 year life span.

Wish my cell phone case was made from that 1,000 year plastic and not the cheap China White they keep pawning off.  I understand that comes from a by product of oil from the Middle East, and China has a 30% shortage of the China White base material at most times.

I don't buy bottled water because of any supposed health benefits over tap water. I buy it because I am thirsty and dont drink sodas. Most of the bottled water I drink is when I am out and stop to get something to drink or am at a job site, meeting etc. not at home where I can just get it from the tap. I think that is also the case with most people.  I will occasionally refill the bottle at home with tap water and leave it in the car. But I often forget. I would prefer bottled tea lol, but they almost always have sugar added. Seems to me that if people werent buying bottled water they would be buying bottled something else to drink. At least the water is better for you than sodas or sugary fruit drinks.

At the racetrack they provide us with a regrigerator full of bottled whatever.  We typically drink on bottle of water, and keep refilling that from the water cooler down the hall in the press tower.  

At tracks that have no water cooler, we may use more than one bottle if there is no regrigerator or ice chest available.  

I think it should be a requirement/law/code to provide a free water cooler per x number of people at events and at specific businesses that have large numbers of visitors.  Believe it is in Missouri or Illinois or both.

I thought this article, and the idea behind the San Francisco rule, was, those two governments won't buy bottled water anymore.  I don't know about San Francisco, but I'm not aware of the City of Tulsa buy much bottled water.  It is certainly not made available to most city employees.  

Is the City of Tulsa buying much bottled water?  And if so, where does it go?

Michael, you forgot about the fuel usage to transport water across the country when tap water is more heavily regulated, tested, and scrutinized!

"Bottled water- the biggest fraud perpetrated on the American public since snake oil." - C71

We don't have a choice but to use bottled water on our boat.  I re-use the bottles until they get pretty ratty.  My wife has recently started buying more "permanent" bottles that we can freeze which won't release dioxins when frozen like throwaway bottles supposedly do.  That may be a total wive's tale.  I know plastic is supposed to release dioxins when heated in a microwave, not so sure about the freezing.

With the bottles intended for re-use, we freeze them and have about a weekend's worth of ice and very cold water to drink.

quote:

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Originally posted by cannon_fodder

Michael, you forgot about the fuel usage to transport water across the country when tap water is more heavily regulated, tested, and scrutinized!

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I gave her some of that info, but it didn't make it in.  The worst is the people who buy water from Fiji...5000 miles away.

I can't remeber the name of the company, but there is a company in Colorado that makes bottled water, and their bottles are 100% biodegradeable. The bottles are made from corn and take about 45 days I think to breakdown.

Found it.

http://www.biotaspringwater.com/ (http://"http://")

Conan:

There are some uses for bottled water.  I drink it myself from time to time.  When I go out on the lake and forget a thermos, or am at QT and decide against pop.  At a ball game.  There are times.

I think his rage is mostly reserved for people who buy it buy the case as a matter of course instead of turning on the tap, filtering, or going to Reasor's and filling their gallons with filtered water.

quote:

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Originally posted by dbacks fan

I can't remeber the name of the company, but there is a company in Colorado that makes bottled water, and their bottles are 100% biodegradeable. The bottles are made from corn and take about 45 days I think to breakdown.

Found it.

http://www.biotaspringwater.com/ (http://"http://")

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Oh no!  This will starve little babies in India using corn to make bottles.  Oh the shame! [;)]

quote:

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Originally posted by Conan71

quote:

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Originally posted by dbacks fan

I can't remeber the name of the company, but there is a company in Colorado that makes bottled water, and their bottles are 100% biodegradeable. The bottles are made from corn and take about 45 days I think to breakdown.

Found it.

http://www.biotaspringwater.com/ (http://"http://")

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Oh no!  This will starve little babies in India using corn to make bottles.  Oh the shame! [;)]

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Don't forget, this will also cause the price of E85 fuel to go up as well.[}:)]

Plastic from orange peels - is it possible to get any greener?

http://www.cnn.com/2005/TECH/science/01/28/plastics.from.oranges/index.html

quote:

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Originally posted by dbacks fan

I can't remeber the name of the company, but there is a company in Colorado that makes bottled water, and their bottles are 100% biodegradeable. The bottles are made from corn and take about 45 days I think to breakdown.

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Drink fast.

I am trying to invent dehydrated water.

You could store that in a better environmental container.

Like Artist, I occasionally buy water when I am thirsty, and its the only thing available.  Maybe I am just getting old, but I recall there used to be more public drinking fountains around (and they usually worked).  Now days, I find them very rarely. I've been told by other mothers that they don't allow their kids to drink from public water fountains.  Guess I am just a bad mom who puts here kids at risk by (gasp) drinking from a water fountain.

quote:

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Originally posted by recyclemichael

I am trying to invent dehydrated water.

You could store that in a better environmental container.

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Great idea.  Just add water, stir, and voila!  Instant water!  I am sure you would make millions.

I think bottled water is the epitome of a rip-off.  I can count on one hand the number of times I have bought a bottle of water in my 50 years, and each time was at a club/bar when I had no other choice for water. (Either that or go drink out of the dirty bathroom faucet.)

I do have a PUR filter on my kitchen faucet, but only use it for filling the ice trays and when Tulsa water has odor problems (not in a long time).  One filter cartridge lasts me nearly a full year.

Are not the majority of all bottled beverages in similar plastic bottles as the bottled water?  

Why pick on the bottled water alone?

quote:

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Originally posted by AMP

Are not the majority of all bottled beverages in similar plastic bottles as the bottled water?  
Why pick on the bottled water alone?

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Yes. I estimate that we have about twice as many soda bottles in our trash as water bottles.

You have a valid point when talking about selective spotlight on one item. There are some differences...

Soda packaging has not changed dramatically in the last few years. Bottled water has gone from almost no sales to now a third of mobile packaged beverages in one decade. There is almost no make it yourself soda choices while water is found in every home. Soda also has many choices including fountain and aluminum.

Interesting fact...about half of Americans recycle, but almost 60% of aluminum cans are recycled. Either recyclers drink more than others or somebody like janitors and the homeless are doing the difference.

You are right that I am probably unfairly picking on one segment. I am doing it because the big messages are being ignored. It is a way to talk while getting attention. I realized this a few years ago when we were seeing the anti-litter messages totally ignored. I have spent three and a half decades saying don't litter and nobody listened.

A few years ago, we ran a anti-litter campaign that just focused on one item in litter, cigarette butts. (I called the campaign "nobody wants to see your butt".)

We weren't against smoking, we were against dropping the remains on the ground. But suddenly, we got some good free media and attention to the messages.

I promise to try the same approach with soda and other items in the waste stream toward a goal of zero waste.

I am sure that RM will correct me if I am wrong, but I have heard that aluminum is the most easily, cost efficient material to recycle. You can recycle 100% of it, and it can be recycled over and over.  We don't drink much soda, but when we do, we buy aluminum cans (also, it won't go flat before you finish, like those big plastic bottles).  So why can't they put water in aluminum cans?

Aluminum cans are very easy to recycle and are actually quite a success story. When you put your recycling bin at the curb or take your cans to a local recycling drop-off center, the cans begin a unbelievably quick journey back into cans.

When the truck fills up, the cans are then put into a warehouse where they are stored until there is enough for a bale of around 25,000 cans. When there are are enough bales to fill a semi, they take it to a smelter who melts them into sheets and then sells the sheets to a can manufacturer. The new cans are made and filled then put on a truck to go to your retail outlet.

The entire process, from your recycling bin to the grocery shelf as a new filled can takes on average about seven weeks.

The energy savings from making cans from recycled materials instead of virgin materials is also a trememndous story. One can recycled saves enough energy to run your television for two hours.

There a lots of good reasons to recycle beverage cans.

When you think about it, the process of making used aluminum cans into new aluminum cans seems fairly wasteful.  You take a product, spend time and energy, and end up with the same product.  At least with a glass bottle, you can refill and re-use it several times (in the case of returnables) and THEN recycle it through the glass plant.

Which uses more energy - recycling aluminum or recycling glass?

They don't really have very many returnable glass bottles anymore. Glass bottle recycling saves much more energy. Here is a fun calculator that shows how much energy you can save by recycling...

http://www.getrecycling.org/theconversionator/shell.html

There are other factors in making products from virgin materials. One has to go no further than Tar Creek area in Northeast Oklahoma to see the effects of mining materials. The number one Superfund site in America is in Oklahoma and is a result of mining metals.

Recycling lessens the need to destroy the Earth.

I think some people miss the point.  A lot of people don't drink bottled water because of its benefits over tap water but rather the convenience it comes in.

I don't buy bottled water for the house but I do when I am driving.  It makes sense.  If this writer had water rage (one step below road), then they need to consider the fact that there are other reasons and perhaps we should look at going back to animal skins.  I guess the argument could be made that I should buy a water bottle that fits in my cup holder and refill it every time.

There is nothing like drinking cold water from kangaroo bladders...[:P]

For those who want to drink non-bottled water. Here is a good deal:
http://www.woot.com/

Today only.