Environmental Responsibility: Bottled Water

           Many Americans, without myself excluded, buy cases of bottled water almost every time the visit a grocery store. Bottled water is convenient for a quick refreshing on the go drink, but this popular bottled drink is causing a lot of damage to our environment. Americans buy more bottled water than any other nation in the world, but many do not realize the damage and waste that doing so is causing. Information about reducing and conserving is being pounded into our brains all the time, but we rarely hear the how the production of what we buy is creating environmental damages, so let me break it down for you. It takes about 17 million barrels of crude oil is to manufacture these bottles. If you fill a water bottle 1/3 of the way up with crude oil, that is about how much it took to produce the bottle. Nearly 7 times as much water is used to produce the bottle than is actually in the bottle. It takes nearly 2000 times more energy on average to produce bottled water than treating and delivering that same amount of tap water. Hopefully a few of those statistics give you an idea about how wasteful producing bottled water actually is. So why is it so hard for us to give up our bottled water? One major reason is convenience. We live in a society where the world is at our fingertips, and we expect quick consumption of everything ranging from our food to our news, but will the knowledge of the damages caused by bottled water help us to find news ways? Another reason we purchase the bottle water is some people believe that it is cleaner than tap water, but that is very untrue. In the United States, local government have strict regulations to make sure the water from our faucet is safe. There have actually been studies that suggest that the chemicals in the bottle itself may contaminate the bottled water. There are many ways you can stop your habit of purchasing and drinking bottled water such as purchasing heavy duty plastic bottles and refilling them, ordering iced tap water at restaurants, pick up your glass at home and fill it up for guests, but if you do happen to purchase a bottle of water, be sure to recycle it!