Interview with Ban the Bottle

We were incredibly fortunate to contact Ban the Bottle, a non-profit organisation which is devoted to banning plastic bottles. We have asked some questions which we hope will provide an insight into their work as well as show you how important it is to ban bottled water. You may have heard about the recent San Francisco bottled water ban. We have asked about that as well, and their answers were incredibly insightful and helpful. The answers are below:

Why do you think there is such a craze for bottled water? What we have heard from many is that bottled water is so popular do to its convenience. You don’t have to remember to fill up a water bottle before you leave the house or try to find somewhere to fill up when out in public. Unfortunately, the bottled water industry has convinced the public that bottled water is safer or cleaner than tap water which has in fact been proven incorrect through hundreds of studies.

 Why do you so strongly disagree with having bottled water? The plastic waste to our environment is immense and that’s not considering what it does to human health. Studies have shown the negative effects that BPA in water bottles has on humans. I recently posted an article that stated over 20 million tons of plastic enters the earth’s oceans each year and a large majority is bottled water.

 What does your organisation do to try and ban bottled water? We promotes the reduction of one-use bottled water. In addition, we support and educate hydration and sustainability. We support organizers with the information we provide via our blog and engage with our follows.

 Recently, there was a bottled water ban in San Francisco and one in Massachusetts. Do you agree with the way that this ban has been implemented? It has been met with a lot of criticism. Those who have criticized the recent bans are those who have been convinced by the bottled water giants that bottled water is fine, and convenient, and better than tap water. It takes less than 1 minute to fill up your reusable water bottle at home or at a refilling station, yet buying a bottled water at the store takes longer!

 Do you think that people will agree if you tell them that tap water is just as safe as bottled water? How do you promote this? Through the various studies we have read up on and are posted on our blog. We conducted a blind taste test and found that more people enjoyed the taste of tap water over bottled water.

Does your organisation do anything to help people in LEDC's that don't have access to clean water? For example, in India, you need to use a water filter instead of drinking tap water, but not everyone has access to that machine. We are a non-profit organization, therefore we do not have the resources to be able to support groups monetarily. Our main goal is to support followers and groups with valuable information in hopes that they take it and use it towards their advantage.

 If you want to check out the Ban the Bottle website, (and we think you should), the link is http://www.banthebottle.net/