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Empty water bottles are the new styrofoam big mac containers. get rid of these things!
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- OBJECTIVE
- PepsiCo, Inc. must package Aquafina water in biodegradable plastic bottles
- TERMS
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If we reach exactly 50,000 people, then we will take our business elsewhere
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- THE PITCH
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Aquafina was the fastest-growing brand of bottled beverage last year. Consumers of Aquafina bottled water care about the environment. Many have asked PepsiCo, the owners of the brand, to begin using a more environmentally responsible packaging. Biodegradable plastic technologies that would work exist today, but PepsiCo chooses to take the easy route and do nothing, shifting the burden onto us, the consumers.
Americans drank 615 million gallons of Aquafina last year at about $4 per gallon. We estimate there are 50 million Aquafina drinkers, typically drinking 100 gallons annually, or spending $400 per year on Aquafina.
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Recent Discussion
Am I allowed to put tap water into my Brita jug?
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Last 4 replies
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Eric Lombardi replied on Dec 10, 2007Unfortunately, “biobottles” are not environmentally friendly in this situation and are a real threat to the existing recycling programs in the world. I am the President of the GrassRoots Recycling Network (www.grrn.org) and we created a campaign over a year ago to STOP the use of bioplastic bottles, even though we support bioplastic “other things.” To see our position we created a website with lots of technical information (http://www.plasticredesignproject.org/PLAHome.htm).
The bottom line is that creating bioplastic bottles takes almost as much oil as a petroplastic bottle, but, the bioplastic bottle will end up in the landfill (for many reasons) where all that embedded energy will be lost, and, the bottle will biodegrade, creating methane, a serious GHG.
Sorry folks, but this is one campaign that shouldn’t go forward at this time. The real campaign should be “clean tap water” so we don’t have to buy bottled water.
Eric Lombardi
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Anonymous replied on Sep 29, 2008i agree with eric. just take your own water with you that you filter yourself. i no longer purchase bottled water. sometimes people visiting will ask for a bottled water and i just explain to them why i don’t purchase it. and then maybe they will ‘get’ it and so on.
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Danny Clark replied on Jan 25, 2009
Plastic bottles are a growing problem in our landfills and oceans. We felt that something needed to be done……and now.
We felt that plastics made from crops that could be producing food, wasn’t the answer. Many reports indicate that in addition to causing our food process to rise, the equipment and chemicals used to produce food based bio-fuel may be increasing pollution.
We knew that there wasn’t going to be one “fix it all” answer and began to wonder if anything was ever going to be done. The problem was growing every day, more bottles were being manufactured and more bottles were accumulating in places where we didn’t need them.
We were wondering if “Earth Friendly Bottles” would ever be available?
That’s why we decided to do our part and started ENSO Bottles. We are partnering with other companies to offer a PET plastic bottle that will biodegrade, compost or recycle.
Our bottles can be produced in a clear or colored version, however, clear version isn’t quite as clear as current PET plastic bottles but then again that’s one way to identify our earth friendly bottle.
ENSO is trying to achieve sustainability with our plastic bottles. Our goal is to make bottles that won’t have the adverse impact on our environment and are made from non food bio-fuels.
We haven’t started making them from bio-fuel but that’s high on our agenda and hopefully will be something we can offer in the future.
But for now, we offer a plastic bottle that is earth friendly…it’s just one step but if we all take just one step toward improving our planet….we will make a difference.
Now all we need is for a lot of beverage companies to start using earth friendly plastic bottles.
Post Reply
I have one Aquafina bottle that I carry around and make a point of showing folks I fill it at a water fountain or bathroom sink. I’ll never pay for water as long as I live within the bounds of the Great Lakes and shame on the rest who find it trendy to pay for water!
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Tim Dunn replied on Jan 19, 2009Tap water has chlorine and chlorine byproducts, which perfectly conventional MDs say cause thousands of cases of cancer every year-so bottled water isn’t just a scam.
There is another kind of biodegradable plastic than the well known PLA made of corn- oxo-biodegradable plastic. It is made of otherwise useless industrial byproducts instead of food, which poor people in the third world already don’t have enough of.
You can make water bottles out of it, and it can be recycled, unlike PLA. It is in the ‘1’ recycle category.
Read more at
link text
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Thomas McMurchy replied on Jan 24, 2009The problem with introducing biodegradable plastic into the current waste system is that there exists relatively few places where this type of material can be effectively processed. This poses two significant issues:
1) If biodegradable plastic is mixed with normal recyclable plastic, the whole batch becomes contaminated and is unable to be reused, hence becoming more landfill. An awful and unproductive outcome.
2) Biodegradable plastic such as PLA, while it does eventually break down in the environmental back to natural elements, this still takes a long time. During this degrading process the bio-plastic still behaves like regular plastic in that it can starved and suffocate wildlife, particularly marine and bird species. Also when bio-plastic is not properly processed in commercial composting facilities a number of chemicals a released into the atmosphere such as methane (27 times the warming capacity of carbon dioxide).
So, while bio-plastic can be a reasonable solution when properly used, the fact remains that the current system is not designed to accommodate biodegradable plastic – and it often ends up doing more harm than good.
Finally, the fact remains that no one who is serious about the environment and its conservation would purchase bottled water especially from one of the largest corporations in the world.
Use the tap!
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Tim Dunn replied on Jan 24, 2009Thomas, you are wrong about all biodegradable plastics being harmful to recycling. Oxo-biodegradable plastics are not harmful to recycling efforts. It is PLA which is harmful to recycling, because it is completely incompatible with PET, yet it looks enough like PET to be mistaken for it. Oxo-biodegradable plastic water bottles are made out of PET.
See: http://www.biodeg.org/recycling.htm
And: http://biogreenproducts.biz/IsOxoHarmful.rtfIf you use the tap, either let the water sit for 24 hours before drinking it, or boil it. Either will remove the chlorine and I hope, subsequent chlorine compounds. Otherwise you are drinking carcinogens! Completely germ-free tap water kills thousands of people every year, according the the American Journal of Epidemeology! See:
http://aje.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract
/165/2/148
Post Reply
It starts free and flitered and comes from fountains and is chilled. Then they charge a buck for it. The profit margins are unprecedented, even better than French fries.
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Audrey replied on Nov 17, 2008Why purchase bottled water ever? Or bottled pop? Are we really so gullible that we think disposable items make our lives better? They reduce the time people used to spend making and cleaning things, but haven’t made our lives any less busy, If anything, the illusion that we would have more free time has only created a culture where we cram our lives even more full!
The busyness crams people and fun out, but that doesn’t have to be….
If you want to have a party, for example, you can use all disposables to allow more time to party. When we were kids, we had plenty of ‘party’ fun, doing dishes together in the kitchen w/ all of our guests. Some of my fondest memories as a child and adult were made in the kitchens of home, friends, church, etc, having ‘suds wars’, dish towel snapping contests, etc.
Reject the sales pitch that material ‘ease’ will make you happy, and enjoy everyday relationships that are so much more satisfying.
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Not using plastic products is difficult, but a firm step toward fighting global climate change. If you want to learn to reduce your carbon footprint even further, please consider joining the Global Stewardship Initiative’s awareness campaign.
Interested in the development of sustainable resources? Read about hemp at:
Post Reply
Why bother to get Aquafina in the first place?
Pepsi uses tap water to bottle up Aquafina and sell it to their naive customers. If people want to drink tap water (yuk!!! The taste of chlorine…), might as well fill up the used bottle from your own kitchen faucet for free! It might be safer and actually tastes better if your faucet has water filter or water electrolyzer machine that makes healthy drinkable alkaline water (having a pH greater than 7 but no higher than 9.5).
Look here for the old news: http://money.cnn.com/2007/07/27/news/companies/pepsi_coke/
Besides, people should reuse their water bottle anyway, if they really concern about the environment. If America can reduce plastic bag for good, we can reduce more plastic water bottle as well.
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