Reduce Waste and Save the Environment
It’s a well-known fact that drinking water, and copious amounts of it, is essential to good health. But, it’s just as important to your body’s health where that water comes from. The health of our environment also depends on how that water gets to you and into your body.
According to National Geographic, Americans currently consume more bottled water than any other nation in the world. With the convenience of being able to grab a bottle and go, it’s no wonder that many people use it to help them get their recommended amount of drinking water each day. With how busy most Americans are, it’s no surprise, then, that National Geographic states that Americans purchase “an impressive 29 billion bottles every year.” What happens to these bottles while being made or after they are used, however, is a cause for concern for our environment.
Making plastic bottles requires using crude oil, oil that could be used to fuel the vehicles we drive, or could be saved from entering the environment altogether if the use of plastic bottles was eliminated or at least reduced. According to the National Resources Defense Council, only about 13 percent of the plastic bottles used for drinking water end up being recycled and the rest end up in our country’s landfills or are burned. In the landfill, the plastic takes hundreds of years to decompose. If burned, toxic byproducts are released into the air. Neither of these situations is healthy for the environment.
Some people use bottled drinking water because they believe that it is healthier and contains less contamination than that of the water coming out of their tap at home. This is not always the case, however. In a 2008 study of bottled water completed by the National Resources Defense Council, “22 percent of the water tested contained contaminant levels that exceeded strict state health limits.”
One eco-friendly solution to this problem is to install a drinking water system in your home. Not only will this water filter provide pure, clean water for you and your family to drink, it will also help reduce plastic waste. This way, you can improve your own health and that of the environment at the same time…a win-win for all of us!
