Message in a Bottle

Awhile back, I posted 5 reasons why bottled water is objectively bad. This morning, I came across an article in the July 2007 issue of Fast Company. Author Charles Fishman recites some startling information, including:

• in 2006 Americans spent $15 billion on bottled water; in 2007 that number should reach $16 billion;
• each week, we transport within the United States around 1 billion bottles of water in trucks, ships & trains;
• 1 out of 6 people in the world have no safe, dependable source of drinking water;
• if you bought and drank a bottle of Evian, you could refill that bottle once a day for 10 years, 5 months and 21 days with San Francisco tap water before that water would cost $1.35;
• 24% of the bottled water we buy is simply municipal water repackaged by Coke and Pepsi.

I agree with Fishman's conclusion that bottled water is not a benign indulgence, but instead is grounded on social, economic and environmental inequities.