Released August 21, 2009
BENTONVILLE, Ark. - When making those back to school purchases, consider adding a refillable water bottle along with the refillable notebooks and pens, Trish Ouei, extension stormwater educator for the University of Arkansas Division of Agriculture said.
"Buying bottled water is very expensive compared to water that comes out of the tap," she said. "Not to mention that some bottled water is just someone else's tap water - check the label. If it says 'from a municipal source, it's some other city's tap water."
Depending on the bottled water purchased, "you could be spending up to 10,000 times more money on your bottled water than tap water," Ouei said. "Refilling one bottle can save lots of money, and what student couldn't use a few extra dollars here and there?"
Refillable water bottles aren't just less expensive, but they're also better for the environment.
Another problem with a water bottle is that here isn't always a convenient place to recycle it.
"Lots of times, the ball park or other facility doesn't have recycling available; so that bottled water that would otherwise be recycled when used at home would now be landfilled," she said. "It is estimated that less than one in six water bottles get recycled. That is not a good rate, especially when Americans consume more than 70 million bottles of water each day!"
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http://www.uaex.edu/news/august2009/0821water_bottles.htm
Writer: Elizabeth Fortune, (501) 671-2120, efortune@uaex.edu
