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Water bottles at the Frisco recycling center
SILVERTHORNE — Silverthorne town council members found pitchers of iced tap water on the table at their regular work session last week, rather than individual containers of bottled water.
With that seemingly minor move, Silverthorne has joined a growing movement of U.S. municipalities taking steps to eliminate water bottles that clog landfills, litter highway shoulders and bob in waterways for years like jellyfish.
From now on, Silverthorne will discourage use of bottled water in all town departments, said town manager Kevin Batchelder.
“It’s an environmental issue,” he said. “It’s an easy thing to do, and I believe it’s important.”
Concern about America’s increasing consumption of bottled water — and the problems with the discards — has spawned a national discussion about its relative risks and benefits.
Some major cities — such as San Francisco and Seattle — have gone as far as prohibiting any use of public funds to buy bottled water.
Last summer, New York City stopped short of an official ban, but launched an advertising campaign encouraging the use of tap water instead.
While many factors contribute to the rise in bottled-water consumption, Silverthorne’s public works director Bill Linfield challenges the suggestion that bottled water is safer than town water.
“We have the good fortune to be the first ones to use (the water), because we’re at the top” as a headwaters community, he said.
Silverthorne’s municipal water supply comes from town wells, which, like much of Summit County, are located near the highest point in the continental watershed.
“Most other municipalities use stream water that’s downstream from someone else’s wastewater plant,” Linfield added.
And much of the bottled water on the grocer’s shelf in Summit County is just that — some other city’s municipal water.
The Aquafina brand bottled water sold locally, for example, is merely Denver city water run through an additional seven filtering steps before being bottled and sent to the High Country, a PepsiCo spokesperson said.
Coca Cola’s most popular water brand — Dasani — is also repackaged municipal drinking water.
High Country Conservation Center director Carly Wier applauded Silverthorne’s decision.
“Bottled water is absolutely one of the most wasteful things in modern history,” she said. “The bottles take a lot of energy to ship, and once they get into consumers’ hands, most end up in the trash.”
Every hour, Americans throw away about 2.5 million plastic bottles, she added.
During the last 10 years, the U.S. appetite for drinking water in plastic packaging has indeed exploded. In 2007, the average American consumed nearly 30 gallons of bottled water, compared with less than half that amount in 1998.
What used to be a fairly small boutique market — offering exotic natural spring water like Perrier and Pellegrino — has grown into a $12 billion a year domestic business, according to statistics from the Beverage Marketing Corp.
Concern about the amount of oil needed to bottle and ship all this water continues to generate extensive public debate.
In 2007, the American bottled water industry used more than 17 million barrels of oil to produce its packaging, reported the Washington-based Earth Policy Institute.
While bottled water’s “carbon footprint” has been the recent focus of environmentalists, a longer-term problem with the industry is related to water itself, said Summit County resident Gary Cook, who worked for nearly 30 years at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory in Golden.
“Water is a ‘commons’ that’ll be more important than oil,” he said.
Long before discussion of bottled water’s consumption of petroleum became widespread, Cook was suspicious of the product.
“I’ve never bought it,” he said. “I think it’s a scam.”
Bottling water and selling it at a premium is a way for large corporations to get a foothold into the water supply, he added.
Growing public criticism of bottled water — like that of Wier and Cook — has yet to make any obvious impact on the industry’s sales, however. The International Bottled Water Association projected continued expansion of revenues worldwide for 2008, with an increase of nearly 8 percent in the U.S. alone.
Rejecting accusations from environmentalists, the Washington-based trade association insisted in a recent press release that the bottled-water industry should not be targeted by municipalities striving to become “green.”
“Solely focusing on bottled water is not the right approach to implement effective environmental policies; broad ranging, comprehensive solutions that cover all consumer goods are,” the release read.
<b>Other local governments follow national trend</b>
Silverthorne isn’t the only town in Summit County to have begun to dispense with bottled water.
Breckenridge’s town council members have been using reusable stainless-steel water containers during their meetings for about six months, town spokesperson Kim DiLallo said.
Although commercial water from a water cooler rather than tap water is used to refill the bottles, the town’s “Green team” aims to continue to minimize disposable water bottle use at all town events.
“Slowly, but surely, we’re working on it,” DiLallo added.
In Frisco, the town council has sipped on tap water for as long as Mayor Bill Pelham can remember.
“We do use bottled tea,” the mayor said. “But we haven’t had bottled water in years.”
This summer, Frisco plans to provide large containers of tap water and sell reusable steel containers at its outdoor events, said town special events and recreation manager Seth Blackmer.
“With our environmentally sustainable practice, we want to get away from the plastic bottles,” he said.
Although the town of Dillon has no official policy on water bottle use, the town council has long avoided them.
“It’s embedded in our culture to think green,” town marketing and events manager Susan Fairweather said. “It’s on the forefront of the way we think with all our events.”
With that seemingly minor move, Silverthorne has joined a growing movement of U.S. municipalities taking steps to eliminate water bottles that clog landfills, litter highway shoulders and bob in waterways for years like jellyfish.
From now on, Silverthorne will discourage use of bottled water in all town departments, said town manager Kevin Batchelder.
“It’s an environmental issue,” he said. “It’s an easy thing to do, and I believe it’s important.”
Concern about America’s increasing consumption of bottled water — and the problems with the discards — has spawned a national discussion about its relative risks and benefits.
Some major cities — such as San Francisco and Seattle — have gone as far as prohibiting any use of public funds to buy bottled water.
Last summer, New York City stopped short of an official ban, but launched an advertising campaign encouraging the use of tap water instead.
While many factors contribute to the rise in bottled-water consumption, Silverthorne’s public works director Bill Linfield challenges the suggestion that bottled water is safer than town water.
“We have the good fortune to be the first ones to use (the water), because we’re at the top” as a headwaters community, he said.
Silverthorne’s municipal water supply comes from town wells, which, like much of Summit County, are located near the highest point in the continental watershed.
“Most other municipalities use stream water that’s downstream from someone else’s wastewater plant,” Linfield added.
And much of the bottled water on the grocer’s shelf in Summit County is just that — some other city’s municipal water.
The Aquafina brand bottled water sold locally, for example, is merely Denver city water run through an additional seven filtering steps before being bottled and sent to the High Country, a PepsiCo spokesperson said.
Coca Cola’s most popular water brand — Dasani — is also repackaged municipal drinking water.
High Country Conservation Center director Carly Wier applauded Silverthorne’s decision.
“Bottled water is absolutely one of the most wasteful things in modern history,” she said. “The bottles take a lot of energy to ship, and once they get into consumers’ hands, most end up in the trash.”
Every hour, Americans throw away about 2.5 million plastic bottles, she added.
During the last 10 years, the U.S. appetite for drinking water in plastic packaging has indeed exploded. In 2007, the average American consumed nearly 30 gallons of bottled water, compared with less than half that amount in 1998.
What used to be a fairly small boutique market — offering exotic natural spring water like Perrier and Pellegrino — has grown into a $12 billion a year domestic business, according to statistics from the Beverage Marketing Corp.
Concern about the amount of oil needed to bottle and ship all this water continues to generate extensive public debate.
In 2007, the American bottled water industry used more than 17 million barrels of oil to produce its packaging, reported the Washington-based Earth Policy Institute.
While bottled water’s “carbon footprint” has been the recent focus of environmentalists, a longer-term problem with the industry is related to water itself, said Summit County resident Gary Cook, who worked for nearly 30 years at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory in Golden.
“Water is a ‘commons’ that’ll be more important than oil,” he said.
Long before discussion of bottled water’s consumption of petroleum became widespread, Cook was suspicious of the product.
“I’ve never bought it,” he said. “I think it’s a scam.”
Bottling water and selling it at a premium is a way for large corporations to get a foothold into the water supply, he added.
Growing public criticism of bottled water — like that of Wier and Cook — has yet to make any obvious impact on the industry’s sales, however. The International Bottled Water Association projected continued expansion of revenues worldwide for 2008, with an increase of nearly 8 percent in the U.S. alone.
Rejecting accusations from environmentalists, the Washington-based trade association insisted in a recent press release that the bottled-water industry should not be targeted by municipalities striving to become “green.”
“Solely focusing on bottled water is not the right approach to implement effective environmental policies; broad ranging, comprehensive solutions that cover all consumer goods are,” the release read.
<b>Other local governments follow national trend</b>
Silverthorne isn’t the only town in Summit County to have begun to dispense with bottled water.
Breckenridge’s town council members have been using reusable stainless-steel water containers during their meetings for about six months, town spokesperson Kim DiLallo said.
Although commercial water from a water cooler rather than tap water is used to refill the bottles, the town’s “Green team” aims to continue to minimize disposable water bottle use at all town events.
“Slowly, but surely, we’re working on it,” DiLallo added.
In Frisco, the town council has sipped on tap water for as long as Mayor Bill Pelham can remember.
“We do use bottled tea,” the mayor said. “But we haven’t had bottled water in years.”
This summer, Frisco plans to provide large containers of tap water and sell reusable steel containers at its outdoor events, said town special events and recreation manager Seth Blackmer.
“With our environmentally sustainable practice, we want to get away from the plastic bottles,” he said.
Although the town of Dillon has no official policy on water bottle use, the town council has long avoided them.
“It’s embedded in our culture to think green,” town marketing and events manager Susan Fairweather said. “It’s on the forefront of the way we think with all our events.”
