The problem of water

Americans use more plastic disposable water bottles than any other country in the world. Eighty percent of them end up in landfills. The Healthy Human website reports:

The production of bottled water uses 17 million barrels of oil a year.

1. It takes 3 times the amount of water in a bottle of water to make it as it does to fill it.
2. Plastic water bottles are made from a petroleum product called polyethylene terephthalate (PET), which requires giant amounts of fossil fuels to make and transport.
3. The production of bottled water uses 17 million barrels of oil a year. That’s slightly more than it would take to fill one million cars a year with fuel.
4. It takes almost 2,000 times the energy to manufacture a bottle of water than it does to produce tap water.
5. If you fill a plastic water bottle so it is about 25% full, that’s about how much oil it took to make the bottle.

One alternative is to drink tap water or filtered tap water. Most tap water in the U.S. is pretty safe. (You can check your municipality's water testing results to reassure yourself.) You can buy filters that attach to your sink faucet, which is the best choice for water filtration, but they are expensive. 

Another option is to use a Brita water pitcher with disposable filters. The filters are made of #5 plastic, which can be difficult to recycle. However, the Brita company maintains a recycling program where you can send the filters back to them on their dime. 

To recycle your Brita filter, go to the Brita Company's website and create an account. If you don't want email from them, make sure to indicate that as you create the account. After you enter your address, you will be emailed a link to print a UPS label.