No More Plastic Bottles. Take the Tap Challenge!

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By Rebecca Martin

Tonight, it occurred to me. How many of us in Kingston are drinking water out of bottles?

What if everyone drank from the tap in Kingston instead?  How many  millions of new gallons would we be consuming?

Take the tap challenge!


1. DRINK FROM THE  TAP! Cooper lake is a beautiful water source. However, there is chlorine and other things it picks up along the way to our taps through treatment and old infrastructure.  Recently, we invested in a filtration system in our home and it’s been terrific. It can be as elaborate or as simple as you can afford and do a really great job at removing some or all of the stuff our bodies don’t need.

Carbon filters does remove chlorine, but does not deal with pharmaceuticals or heavy metals. Reverse Osmosis is the only solution. We even have a UV in our home water filtration system, just in case.

Kingston tap water is quite acidic. Always add a little lemon. It changes the quality to make it alkaline.

A SOLUTION:  We found a really great company called HUDSON VALLEY WATER RESOURCES. Their offices are located in New Paltz, but Joe the owner lives in Kingston! He is a real pro – and a pleasure to work with. Give him a call and get your water tested.  If you have other tips on local water filtration companies or ideas, post them in the comment section. It’s helpful to have resources on this front.  You know what else, by drinking more of Kingston’s tap water – we’ll be providing Kingston’s water department with more business.  That’s a win/win.

I love these stainless steel water bottles. Get yourself a big one and keep filling it up (and add lemon!)

2. POLAND SPRING IS NESTLE.  The next time you pick up a bottle of Poland Spring water, look at the dozen sources it is taken from and then shipped all around the world.  Think twice about buying Poland Spring or any brand that is taking water away from the community where it originates. They need their water just like we need ours. 

A SOLUTION:  If one must buy bottled water in Kingston, then go to BINNEWATER ICE who are truly a  local family business.  Offices with water coolers, lets get rid of Poland Spring. Call Binnewater instead.

Because after all, those looking to profit only sell what we will buy. Lets all think about that and take steps towards the tap.

7 thoughts on “No More Plastic Bottles. Take the Tap Challenge!”

  1. Brilliant! I’ll take that challenge, such as it is: I already drink Kingston’s tap water. But thanks for the Binnewater and stainless steel cup sources AND, thank you for the Nestle/Poland Spring info. I think it’s time for us to invest in a carbonated water maker.

    And yes: ALKALIZEALKALIZE ALKALIZE!!

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  2. Yeah, baby! This is great. I have a water filter and drink from the tap, and it’s great.

    Like Sari, I had no idea Poland Spring was Nestle. Thank you for that as well.

    Keep being you, Rebecca. Cuz you are the best.

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  3. Start with taking all the bottled water out of the County Office building and anywhere else that our ‘public servants’ have decided to spend public money on purchasing bottled water. It seems like no matter which government or public office you go into , you can see bottled water being used by the employees/administrators . All on the public dime mind you .

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  4. I use a Brita filter for drinking. For larger amounts of consumable water, I take from the tap and leave in an open container. Both chlorine and fluoride degas from water over time. Works for me.

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  5. Plastic bottles. Has anyone [besides myself] tried to figure out how many plastic bottles the Niagara plant would make each day? My calculations say 10.6 million bottles made each day at full production.
    ………………………………………….
    About Bottles: My calculations from information in the Niagara bottling plant Environmental Assessment Form made by Chazen Companies for the Town of Ulster.

    PLEASE CHECK THESE CALCULATIONS YOURSELF AND THINK WHY THEY, OR THE BASIC NUMBERS THEY ARE DERIVED FROM, MAY BE MISLEADING ABOUT THE IMPACTS OF THIS PROJECT!

    Google says that this report is at the http://www.kingstoncitizens.org website I have it as a downloaded pdf file titled 239958583-Niagara-Bottling-plant-proposal.pdf

    The “Full Environmental Assessment Form” (EAF) was part of the report.

    TRUCK TRIPS PER DAY:
    The EAF says (at D.2. j.ii.) that 260 trucks would enter and leave the site daily, a total of 520 trips/day.
    Calculations:
    24 hours x 60 minutes = 1440 minutes/day
    1440 m/d / 520 truck trips = 2.76 minutes between trucks, if they travel night and day, and are evenly spaced.

    PLASTIC BOTTLES PER DAY AND PER TRUCK:
    The EAF says (at D.2.c.i.) that the maximum amount of water which would be taken from, Cooper Lake would be 1.75 million gallons per day (Mg/d).
    The EAF says (at D.2.d.i.) that total liquid waste generation would be 345,000 gallons/day, which is .345Mg/d.
    The company website, at niagarawater.com/beverages says that their most popular size is 16.9 ounces (oz).
    Calculations:
    1.75Mg/d – .345Mg/d = 1.405Mg/d
    1.405Mg/d x 128oz/gallon = 179.84Moz/d
    179.84Moz/d / 16.9oz/bottle = 10.64million bottles/day
    10.64Mbottles/d / 260 outbound trucks = .0409Mbottles/outbound truck = 40,900 bottles per truck.

    PLASTIC BOTTLES PER MONTH AND YEAR:
    10.64Mbottles/d x 30d/month = 319.24million bottles per month
    10.64Mbottles/d x 365d/year = 3.884 billion bottles per year

    ARE PLASTIC BOTTLES COUNTED IN THE SOLID WASTE GENERATION?:
    The EAF says [at D.2.r.i.] 6.6tons of solid waste will be generated each month. I am assuming that they mean the various waste ancillary to the production, and not the actual bottles, which will become solid waste in a matter of days or weeks. For the purposes of this exercise, I will assume that the bottles SHOULD BE INCLUDED as solid waste in the EAF.
    Calculations:
    1 ton = 2000pounds
    1 pound = 16 ounces
    1 ton = 2000 x 16 = 32000 oz/ton
    6.6tons x 32000oz/ton = 211,200oz of solid waste per month
    211,200oz/ 319,240,000 bottles = .0006616 per bottle … if no bottles were recycled and all went to solid waste.
    This seems very light for a bottle. Perhaps, under the EAF assumptions, most of the bottles were to be recycled. If 99% of the bottles were recycled, then each bottle might weigh 100 times as much as the last calculation assumes.
    .0006616 oz/bottle x 100 = .06616oz/bottle.
    This still seems light. If 99.9% of the bottles were recycled, then each bottle might weigh 1000 times as much as the ‘not recycled’ calculation.
    .0006616 oz/bottle x 1000 = .6616oz/bottle.
    This might be a bit heavy. It seems to me that the EAF would have to be assuming that between 99% and 99.9% of the bottles would be recycled. At the meeting this tuesday night at Kingston City Hall, I heard Alex Beauchamp from Food and Water Watch say that way less than that gets recycled. Did he say that 4 of 5 bottles go to landfill?

    The Niagara company has won awards for its lightweight ‘Eco-Air Bottle’ which uses 60% less than a regular bottle and is 100% recyclable. Someone should go weigh these bottles and do some calculations. How much plastic would this Niagara bottling plant use every year? Use a very good scale, and weigh as many bottles as you can find, dry of course, then divide by the number of bottles to get a reasonable guess at an average weight.
    How many of those bottles would end up as solid waste?

    WHAT DOES 1.75 MILLION GALLONS PER DAY LOOK LIKE? IS THAT A GOOD WAY TO THINK ABOUT IT?:
    I also started to learn a little about measuring water flows, in order to visualize how much water 1.75Mg/d is in terms of stream flow. It is not a huge stream. Try looking at http://web.deu.edu.tr/atiksu/ana52/ani4022-2.html and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weir .
    I think a v-notch wier is a good way to think about it. It should take an hour or so to read enough to have some sense of converting “Mg/d” numbers to a visceral sense of how this might affect a stream flow. This is very different from how it might affect a standing body of water, because the flow would be continuing indefinitely and a lot of water could be used. It gets complex to think about this stuff. Does it really have long term affects on water table recharge if bottled water is trucked away? Even though the watershed is getting water input from cloud which travel from a distance? Perhaps thinking about how the ‘net flows’ are manifested by the water level in the lake, which varies over time, could help with this. How much of current water useage is not delivered back into the Cooper Lake watershed? I am not a hydrologist. You will have to learn that on your own, or find people to talk to. Ask several people, as I suspect that views and opinions vary.

    HOW FAST ARE BOTTLES MADE:?
    10.64Mbottles/d is a lot of bottles.
    24hours/day x 60minutes/hour x 60 seconds/minute = 86,400 seconds/day.
    10.46M bottles/d / 86400 s/d = 121.06 bottles/second.
    How many machines would it take to make that many bottles and fill them?

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  6. Brilliant! Bottled water is the greatest marketing scam of all time! We get water delivered conveniently at the turn of a a knob, at a price no one can meet!

    Save Cooper Lake!

    Protect Kinston’s Water.

    Drink from a cup, mug mason jar, stainless water bottle and red-neck whine glass! Whatever it takes to make you feel good about drinking the same water someone would like to sell you in a plastic bottle.

    Lea

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