WORLD WATCH

Vision for a Sustainable World

LIFE-CYCLE STUDIES

Bottled Water

Excerpted from the March/April 2004 WORLD WATCH magazine

2004 Worldwatch Institute

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 LIFE-CYCLE STUDIES
Raw Materials
Bottled Water Bottled water comes in three
basic forms. Natural mineral
water generally contains steady
Overview concentrations of minerals (in the
Seventy percent of the Earths surface is covered with water, but more and more people United States, 250 parts per mil-
now get theirs out of bottles. Global consumption of bottled water is rising about 12 per- lion total dissolved solids); these
cent per year, supported by annual spending of about $35 billion. Drivers include cheap and are thought by some people, with-
convenient packaging, water shortages, and, in some parts of the world, serious concerns out much evidence, to be health-
about water quality. (About 1.5 billion people lack access to safe drinking water and millions ful. Sources are supposed to be
die every year from diseases linked to tainted water.) Many Americans who drink bottled pollution free, though the water
water believe that it is safer than tap water, although a study of a thousand bottles sold may contain naturally occurring
in U.S. stores revealed known and/or possible carcinogens in a fifth of them. bacteria. Spring water also comes
Claro Cortes IV, REUTERS 2001 from underground sources but
Closing the Loop? need not contain minerals. Purified
Bottle recycling bills have been wateressentially the same as
enacted in Austria, Belgium, tap watercan be drawn from
Canada, Denmark, Finland, Ger- almost any source (surface or
many, the Netherlands, Norway, underground) and is treated to
Sweden, Switzerland, and 11 U.S. make it potable.
states. In West Bengal, India, the HAll three kinds of water are
Pollution Control Board last year usually marketed in plastic
issued a ruling that bottle produc- bottles made from polyethylene
ers were responsible for collecting terephthalate (PET) resin. Sales
used bottles and recycling them. of PET more than doubled during
HAs for the water itself: According the 1990s, reaching 738 million
to the World Wildlife Fund, 75 per- kilograms in 1999.
cent of bottled water is produced
Ed Whe
eler/CORBI
for local consumption. Even so, no S
bottled water production system
can be as efficient as public drink-
ing water systems. If the spreading
popularity of bottled water repre-
sents a private solution to the
failure of public infrastructure,
the more effective answer would
be to build or overhaul the public
systems. 2002
EUTERS
ing, R
Jeff Topp

Production and Distribution

Making the bottles from PET means
releasing significant amounts of air
pollutants. The manufacture of one
kilogram of PET (enough to make PE T unle
about 17 1.5-liter bottles) entails a
Sa les of p shed:
the release into the air of 40 olyethyle
bottles h n
grams of hydrocarbons, 25 grams ave soar e terephtha late
ed.
of sulfur oxides, 18 grams of carbon
ater
rs p ire , the w rigueur. monoxide, 20 grams of nitrogen oxides, and 2.3 kilograms
pe d de
ple who ous an of carbon dioxide. All have direct or indirect effects on climate.
For peo now ubiquit
bottle
is HThe growing popularity of bottled water has prompted worries about the
strain on certain water supplies. Several Canadian provinces with abundant
fresh water have considered or implemented bans on exports of fresh water
Fates
to head off exploitation by multinational beverage corporations.
Bottles made from PET are recyclable
HThe transport of the materials for making the bottles, and of the filled
(theyre labeled with a 1 in the recycle triangle).
bottles to market, both require substantially greater expenditures of energy
Yet of the 14 billion water bottles sold in the
than would be used in piping water to consumers.
United States in 2002 (most made from
PET), 90 percent wound up in the trash. This life-cycle based on research conducted by Paul McRandle of The Green Guide