The Slagosphere

Bear a plastic water bottle to your own peril; the tide of popular belief is forming away from you. From big rating documentaries, to articles and politics, the biggest debate in our lives is the terror of bottled water and the waste that the industry demonstrates.

The processing, transporting and disposal of water in petrochemical plastic bottles requires tremendous amounts of water along with energy, and pumps out huge amounts of greenhouse gases and waste.

Director of the recent documentary ‘Tapped: get off the bottle’ Stephanie Soechtig says “1500 water bottles end up in landfill every second – that’s 30 million water bottles a day! We wanted to show people just how much waste is generated by bottled water.” The Tapped crew are publicizing the show with their across-America roadshow, collecting money from people to reduce their water bottle waste and changing their used plastic water bottle in exchange for a reusable stainless steel bottle. Download Tapped from Amazon or iTunes.

A short film ‘The Story of Bottled Water’ was released on World Water Day in March. From the pen of Annie Leonard of the well-received ‘The Story of Stuff’, this animated film displays the methodology that is used to swaying Americans into buying around hundreds of millions of bottles of water a week, despite the option of a few cents cost for clean tap water. Find her documentary on You Tube.

Through her book ‘Bottlemania’, writer Elizabeth Royte explores one of the greatest marketing heists of the last century and gives a powerful environmental alarm bell. She investigates the problems we must at some point answer to. Who appropriates our water? What could happen when a bottled-water corporation holds your town’s drinking water? Is the water coming from a tap wholly safe? What really is the environmental footprint of production, transportation and disposing of a single plastic water bottle?

Politicians from everywhere around the international community are acknowledging that they need to take responsibility for action – markedly when the meetings in which they collate are major consumers of bottled water. How often do we observe a politician at a political debate sipping from a water bottle. They might drink from a water glass in Parliament House.

Leslie Samuelrich of Corporate Accountability International, told “Cities and states are spending hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars on bottled water, and that’s not to mention what’s spent to deal with all the plastic bottles that are thrown out.”

In July 2009, the NSW rural town of Bundanoon became the first place from Australia to ban the selling of bottled water. Some 60 cities in the American states and some places in Canada and the UK have prohibited the expenditure of taxpayer money on bottled water.

Surely these problems will be tabled come World Water Week 2010 from September 5 to 11 in Stockholm, Sweden, the annual meeting for the planet’s most problematic water-related dilemmas.

Article written by Tracey Bailey, founder of Biome Eco Stores.

Uncategorized water bottle

You are doing the right thing for the planet by filling up at home and carrying a reusable water bottle and you’ve chosen a safe, non-toxic bottle-but if it’s not kept clean then it may not be healthy.

Whether your drink bottle is a stainless steel bottle, SIGG bottle or a BPA free plastic water bottle, it is important to stop mould and other deposits forming in the bottle.

Wash your drink bottles with warm, soapy water at the end of every day and let the bottle air dry upside down with the top off every day where possible.

Should any mineral deposits or lime scale form inside, fill your clean water bottle with Distilled White Vinegar and let it soak for 24 hours. Then rinse with warm water mixed with one tablespoon of bicarbonate of soda (baking soda), rinse out and let dry. Spots inside the bottle that look like “corrosion” are most likely a mineral deposit.

Fill your bottle with filtered water wherever possible. It tastes so much better, but also because water contains different minerals in every area this may affect what happens inside your bottle.

Do not allow liquids such as fruit juice to ferment inside the bottle.

With all reusable water bottles you can also try SIGG cleaning tablets and a specially-designed SIGG bottle cleaning brush, or simply a baby bottle brush. Only ever use a soft brush on aluminium bottles with lining like SIGG so as not to damage the lining. Stainless steel water bottles like Klean Kanteen and Nathan can handle a hard brush.

While all bottles are technically dishwasher-safe, it is recommended to not put them in a dishwasher. Most dishwasher powders are caustic, so they will eat into the metal of your bottle and damage the exterior pattern. Bottle tops should also not be put in the dishwasher because extreme heat expands and deteriorates the plastic.

Never freeze metal bottles as metal can split even with only a little water inside. Water does not always expand in a predictable direction! Freezing plastic water bottles is also not advisable because it may cause the plastic to breakdown and toxins to leach. It is fine to place your bottle in the refrigerator.

Tips on cleaning your water bottle brought to you by Biome Eco Stores Australia.

Uncategorized how to clean water bottle, SIGG, water bottle