Bottle Battles

Background:

A number of communities (campuses, towns, cities, etc.) around the world have proposed and enacted plastic water bottle bans in some form.

In 2013 the small town of Concord, Massachusetts (population approximately 19,000) became the first town or city in the United States to ban the sale of single-serving Polyethylene terephthalate (PET) bottles less than or equal to 1 liter (34 ounces) containing water which is non-sparkling and non-flavored (in other words, plain water). The sale of water in bottles of any size made of other types of plastic or other materials, as well as PET bottles of flavored or sparkling water, soda, tea, juices, and other non-plain water beverages, regardless of size, is allowed. See FAQ document.

Concord citizens supporting this action stated various reasons including: concerns of plastic garbage and litter, use of fossil fuels in the production of plastic, product transportation emissions, damage to water-providing aquifers, and beliefs that businesses shouldn’t profit on the sale of a free resource.

Since enactment of Concord's ban, a handful of other communities in the United States have enacted single-serving water bottle bans, the largest being the city of San Francisco (population approximately 885,000) who banned the sale of single-serving water bottles on city property in 2014. Just recently, the San Fran Francisco Airport decided to comply with its city’s law and banned the sale of single-serving water bottles, making it the first airport to do so.

Not everyone is in favor of these bans, nor does everyone think that these bans will have any impact on the issues they are trying to address. Opponents include the International Bottled Water Association (IBWA) who, after the San Francisco ban, stated that there are unintended consequences to these bans as they may lead to "more packaging, more additives (e.g., sugar, caffeine), and greater environmental impacts than bottled water." Additionally, as we have seen in recent world news, in some areas (e.g. unavailability/inaccessibility of fresh water) and under some circumstances (e.g. natural disasters, compromises in water delivery) bottled water is a necessary and critical resource.