Issue
Question1234
bottled_water.docxBottled water is drinking water that has been packaged in plastic or glass containers and sold for individual consumption. There are many varieties of bottled water, including mineral water, purified water, spring water, artesian water, and sparkling water.
The sales of bottled water have reached astonishing heights in recent years. According to the Beverage Marketing Corporation (BMC), between 1998 and 2002 global bottled water consumption increased by 60 percent, and since then has continued to rise, growing by 6.2 percent in 2012. According to recent figures, US residents consume more bottled water than any other beverage except carbonated soft drinks, a habit that adds up to billions of liters of water each year.
In 2012, according to the BMC, the total spending on bottled water in the United States reached an estimated $12 billion, despite the availability of clean and inexpensive tap water. There is a prevailing belief-influenced in part by the marketing claims of the bottled water industry-that drinking purified bottled water is safer than drinking tap water, which may contain microorganisms, traces of chemicals, and other contaminants. Additionally, many minerals waters are promoted as having important health benefits; the trace minerals have long been considered, especially by Europeans, important dietary supplements, even to the point of the water being classified as food. In addition, bottled water is seen by many as a convenience that is worth the extra expense. However, the huge amount of energy involved in packaging water (typically in bottles made of polyethylene terephthalate, PET, plastic), transporting it, and disposing of the bottles has been widely criticized for its impact on the environment.
Given the fact that large parts of the world’s population do not have access to sufficient clean drinking water, some see the popularity of bottled water in developed countries as a shameful luxury. However, the continued growth of the industry points to the fact that for many people, bottled water has quietly become an indispensable ingredient of daily life.
Mineral Water: Water that naturally contains a certain minimum percentage of dissolved mineral solids, such as salts and sulfur compounds.
PET Plastic: Plastic made from polyethylene terephthalate. The production process for PET involves large amounts of fossil fuels (petroleum and natural gas).
Purified Water: Water that has been produced through a process of desalination or deionization; it contains no dissolved minerals or contaminants.
Spring/Artesian Water: Water that comes from natural underground springs and either flows to the surface on its own or is tapped by a well.
Sparkling Water: Water that has had carbon dioxide artificially added to it, making it bubbly. Also called carbonated water.
Although the bottled water industry is a relatively modern phenomenon, the practice of collecting water from natural spring sources and transporting it to be consumed elsewhere is as ancient as human civilization. The earliest containers for water included animal skins, ostrich eggs, and earthen jugs. Later, Roman troops are believed to have deliberately sought out sources of good drinking water. Legend has it that Hannibal and the Carthaginian army stopped at a spring welling forth with naturally sparkling water. This is supposedly the same spring from which Perrier, a major brand of bottled water, is drawn today.
In the eighteenth century, the spa movement became a cultural phenomenon. Many well-to-do people flocked to health centers located near natural mineral springs in Europe and the United States. The wealthy were drawn to the supposed benefits of drinking, bathing, and showering in these waters. It was not long before business-minded entrepreneurs realized that even more money could be made bottling water from such springs and selling it to those who could not travel to the spas or wished to bring home the therapeutic waters. By the nineteenth century, spa water bottling operations had appeared all over Europe and North America. Some US bottled water corporations that are still in operation today, including the Saratoga Springs and Poland Springs companies, date to this era.
In the mid-nineteenth century, when the industry was in its infancy, bottled water was a relatively expensive indulgence, and the bottling of water took place on a relatively small scale; water was packaged in glass or ceramic containers with stoppers that were made out of either cork or porcelain. As the market for the product grew, however, and as the development of railway systems made it easier to transport large quantities of bottled water, the industry model slowly transformed into one of mass production. In the mid-twentieth century, bottled water was packaged in plastic containers for the first time by a French company, and the invention of PET plastic bottles (which were both stronger and lighter than earlier plastic bottles) soon followed in the 1980s.
In the United States, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is responsible for issuing and enforcing regulations governing the safety of tap water; the Food and Drug Administration is responsible for similar regulations for bottled water. In the late 1980s, the FDA was criticized for not publishing stricter guidelines for bottled water safety. The situation came to a head in 1990, when bottles of Perrier were found to contain a chemical called benzene, a known carcinogen, and public outcry ensued.
Since then, the FDA has set forth more stringent regulations regarding the levels of various contaminants in bottled water, but opponents of the industry still claim that the department does not devote enough resources to regulating bottled water, is slow to respond to safety issues, and does not oversee bottling plants as closely as the EPA oversees municipal water systems.
The United States is the biggest consumer of bottled water in the world (although the Asian and South American markets are growing rapidly), partly because of increasing health consciousness among Americans who believe that bottled water is safer and purer to drink than unfiltered tap water, which may contain chlorine, lead, traces of pesticides, or various minerals. Many consumers of bottled water in the United States are also drawn to the portability and convenience of this product; some also find its taste more palatable than that of tap water. In other countries, where clean drinking water is a genuine scarcity, bottled water companies have been able to provide a useful service-but at a cost that is sometimes thousands of times higher than the cost of tap water.
Because of rising international and local concern over the problem of climate change, the controversy over bottled water today is focused largely on the industry’s environmental impact. Critics of bottled water point to alarming statistics. The Green Guide reports that the fossil fuels required to make PET water bottles for the US market alone account for the consumption of over 1.5 billion barrels of oil annually. According to the Worldwatch Institute, nearly 80 percent of these bottles are not recycled, and each year, more than 4 billion pounds of PET end up in landfills, where the material will not biodegrade for up to 1,000 years. In addition, bottled water often travels so far from its original source that as much energy is used in transporting it as is needed to produce it.
The bottled water industry counters these criticisms with the argument that all consumer products, not just bottled water, have energy costs associated with bringing them to market. Bottled water production, it claims, is responsible for only a tiny percentage of all public water usage in the country. In addition, when communities are hit by natural catastrophes, such as Hurricane Katrina in the Gulf of Mexico in 2005 or the devastating forest fires in California in 2007, bottled water can provide much-needed hydration when people are cut off from city water systems.
The industry also points out that water is essential for health and well-being, and that bottled water represents a cleaner, safer, and more convenient source of the hydration that consumers need. More and more, bottled water companies are working to increase the health benefits associated with their products, by marketing vitamin-enriched water as a kind of nutritional supplement. Nevertheless, opponents continue to assert that bottled water is not only an unnecessary indulgence, but an environmental disaster. Meanwhile, the popularity of reusable water containers continues to grow. In 2011, Evian introduced a new bottle design for its product, made of l1 percent less plastic and using 50 percent recycled plastic. Bottled water continues to be the source of controversy: the US Parks Service announced that it would taper off the sale of bottled water in national parks, encouraging parks to provide refilling stations. However, in 2015, Congress, under pressure from lobbyists from the bottled-water industry, threatened to cut funding to the Parks Department if it did so.
Books
Chapelle, Frank. Wellsprings: A Natural History of Bottled Spring Water. Piscataway: Rutgers UP, 2005. Print.
Ingram, Colin. The Drinking Water Book: How to Eliminate Harmful Toxins from Your Water. Berkeley: Ten Speed, 2006. Print.
Shiva, Vandana. Water Wars: Privatization, Pollution, and Profit. Cambridge: South End, 2002. Print.
Periodicals
“Bottled Water Industry Profile: United States.” Bottled Water Industry Profile: United States (2013): 1-40. Business Source Alumni Edition. Web. 14 Jan. 2014.
Dolesh, Richard J. “The Problem with Bottled Water.” Parks & Recreation 49.5 (2014): 36–38. Print.
Fishman, Charles. “Message in a Bottle.” Fast Company 117 (2007): 110. Web. 22 Oct. 2015.http://www.fastcompany.com.ezproxy.rasmussen.edu/magazine/117/features-message-in-a-bottle.html
Hawkins, Roberta, and Jody Emel. “Paradoxes of Ethically Branded Bottled Water: Constituting the Solution to the World Water Crisis.” Cultural Geographies 21.4 (2014): 727–43. Print.
Mikhailovich, Katja, and Robert Fitzgerald. “Community Responses to the Removal of Bottled Water on a University Campus.” Intl. Journ. of Sustainability in Higher Education 15.3 (2014): 330–42. Print.
Nuenning, J. “US Market Potential for Quality Water.” Drink Technology & Marketing 17.1 (2013): 30-1. Print.
Rein, Lisa. “Park Service to Big Water: No Federal Funding for Bottled Water Bans? We’ll Find Our Own Money, Thanks.” Washington Post. Washington Post, 30 July 2015.
Reyes, Maridel. "What’s in Your Water?" Business Week 4418 (2015): 85. Readers' Guide Full Text Mega (H.W. Wilson). Web. 22 Oct. 2015.
Savka, Natalya. “One Word: Plastics.” Sierra 100.5 (2015): 41-43. General Science Full Text (H.W. Wilson). Web. 22 Oct. 2015.
These essays and any opinions, information or representations contained therein are the creation of the particular author and do not necessarily reflect the opinion of EBSCO Information Services.
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By M. Lee
Co-Author: Tom Warhol
Tom Warhol is a naturalist, writer, and photographer living in Vermont. He holds a Master of Science degree in Forestry from the University of Massachusetts, and he has worked as a conservation professional for the Massachusetts Riverways Program, The Nature Conservancy, and The American Chestnut Foundation. He is also the author of several books, including Biomes of Earth, a six-volume series, and three volumes in Benchmark Books’ Animalways series-Eagles, Hawks, and Owls.
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