from an article at:
Green Energy News
Nowadays, most people probably agree that we need to drink plenty of water in order to stay healthy, avoid dehydration and to function efficiently. The exact quantity of water that you need will vary according to your body mass and size, climatic conditions you find yourself in and the level of physical activity in which you are engaged. However, most medical authorities currently suggest that your daily water intake should be between six and eight large glasses of water.
This perfectly sound medical advice has been one factor used in the advertising campaigns of bottled water suppliers to very effectively market their product. The bottled water market is relatively new – but it is very large. Consumer demand for bottled water more than doubled between 1997 and 2005, and over 200 billion bottles of water are sold worldwide per annum.
That’s a massive amount of empty bottles being thrown away. Some – a little less than a quarter of the total according to current statistics – are recycled. The rest end up as landfill. The environmental consequences are significant. If all of those empty bottles were aligned end to end, they would span a distance covered long enough to get to the moon and back – 56 times!
The amount of carbon emissions involved, both in the production of the bottles and the transportation of the finished product, is also worthy of consideration. It’s an amazing fact that the production of the bottles uses three times as much water as the bottles contain when they are shipped.
Bottled water is, simply put, an environmental disaster. Of course, it’s not out of the question that you may be more worried about your own health than that of the planet – which may well be understandable in many cases. The problem with this logic is that there is absolutely no evidence that bottled water is better for your health than common or garden tap water.
Tap water in North America and Europe is perfectly safe to drink and is subject to stringent checks. Some bottled water has been found to contain traces of uranium and estrogen chemicals. Some of the chemicals found in bottled water are as a result of “leeching” from the plastic (PET) bottles. It’s also established that many bottled waters contain, along with other minerals, salt – which is not very good for your blood pressure.
The only reason you might conceivably be tempted to use bottled water would be the taste. However, in blind taste tests most consumers are unable to tell the difference between bottled water and tap water. Of course, if your house is in a hard water area, or if you just don’t like the taste of your tap water (perhaps due to chlorine which is often used by the water supplier to kill bacteria) you may wish to evluate other alternatives.
You could consider using a home filtration system – which will be better for the environment, better for your health and very much cheaper than bottled water. You can install whole house filtration systems, under sink filters. All of these solutions will remove contaminants, enhance taste and reduce water hardness in a manner which is environmentally friendly.
