Do you drink bottled water?

Question

Just curious how many people drink bottled water and why. Did you know that Dasani and Aquafina (bottled by Coke and Pepsi, respectively) are just re-filtered tap water? In other words, you could be getting the same water almost for free out of your tap at home.

Additionally, 70% of these water bottles don't get recycled. Plus the heavy water has to be transported around in trucks and planes, depending on where it comes from. All that energy used for water you could just be getting from the tap. Not to mention the fact that tests have shown that bottled water is no cleaner than tap water.

• 22% of the bottled water tested contained contaminants at levels that violated safe drinking water health standards for the state in which they were purchased.

• 33% of bottled water tested did not meet the state’s safety standard for bacterial contamination, chemical contamination, or both.

http://www.aquamd.com/water_health/bottled_water.cfm

So if you drink bottled water, why?

Answer 1

I drank bottled water because i did not know these facts and now you can forget about me drinking bottled water!! Other people drink bottled water because they also dont know these facts and bottled water is so convinient.

Answer 2

I'm on a mission this year which is to get into healthy eating, exercise and other habits. One of which is drinking more water. I know that I'm no good to fight the big fights until I've fought the little ones at home.

Not that my reasons are good enough but they are mine:

I've never had a problem with tap water until I moved to the country 6 mos ago. The tap water tastes like minerals and I usually end up feeling more dehydrated after drinking it, not that that stops me from drinking it. The bottled water tastes better, and doesn't leave me feeling funny.

Also, I have trouble drinking any water at all. So I started to buy those 24 packs of water and put it in my car, and I am now closer to the daily standard I should be drinking.

I do recycle my bottles. (I throw them in my truck and recycle them once a week ;-)

I appreciate your facts, they are definitely an eye openers.

Answer 3

No! Bottled water is a joke! The laws on purification are more stringent on tap water than bottled, so many people are paying $ for some to bottle tap water in a plastic bottle that leaches contaminants and fills earth with huge supples of senseless plastic!
I drink tap water (which happens to be pretty good in my area) which I would buy a home-purification system if I felt is was necessary. I've bought alloy bottles that I refill and keep in the fridge.
I can find much better uses for my money; and be green at the same time!

Answer 4

Yes I do, because the tap water in my area has high mercury content...or higher than i am comfortable with anyway, and I buy it in 5 gallon containers which are picked up by the guy who delivers it.
The tap water here, has many other pollutants in it, that i would rather not put into my body.
It is filtered by reverse osmosis, and is far better than any tap water i have ever consumed.

you are correct about bottled water, that is bottled by soda companies. I used to work in one, and all they did was use tap water, run it through a softener and filter, and dump a squirt of nitrogen in it before capping the bottle.

That wasn't Dasani, I have a little more trust in Dasani, but i haven't been in their production facility, so i have no clue how it is handled. I don't pay $2 for a bottle of water anyway.

Answer 5

The thing is, I think people drink bottled water because it's more convenient. For example, if you go to an amusement park or something and they have a stand where they sell bottled water, even if it's for three dollars, visitors would still buy it for the sake of quenching their thirst. The thing with filters is that you have to change them, which a lot of people are too lazy to do. With bottled water, you can bring it with you anytime you want without the need for cups (regardless of how it hurts the environment). As for the contamination part, nobody really gets sick or notices some kind of sickness spreading due to drinking from bottled water, therefore... people keep on buying and drinking the stuff.

Answer 6

Yes we get bottled water delivered through Ice Mountain water. The bottles go back when they're empty and we also recycle the on-the-go bottles we occasionally use.

Why? Taste, convenience, and knowing that our water supply does not have any harmful chemicals. Our neighboring town's water supply got contaminated from a landfill that had been closed for 20 years. The whole town was ordered to get bottled water.

Our bottled water doesn't have any funny taste to it and that's a big plus.

Answer 7

I recycle all my plastic.
I use water bottles because of the convenience. The water up here has no fluoride in it so I buy the fluoridated water at the store for my kids. In addition, my tap water has way too much chlorine. There are three kids in tow when I go somewhere and I take them with me in the car.
:)
I wouldn't put my trust in a study that does not disclose how many sources where tested and how the testing was conducted.
Have you had your tap water tested?

Answer 8

I drink bottled water because the tap water here tastes horrible. Surprisingly, we have artesian wells underneath our city, and me and my family try to use them as often as possible. We've started saving milk jugs and juice jugs to get the water. It's free, and tested regularly. Bottled water is a lot of times more convenient to get, though. Especially since i live in the dorms through out the year, and don't always have the chance to go back home to get the artesian water. I almost always reuse the bottles that the water comes in, anyway. I fill them up with juice or anything else so i can easily take them to class and not spill it. However, you can only refill certain plastic bottles about 2 or 3 times before the bottle starts to break down in your water. It's not exactly noticeable, but the bottles are so thin that they do start to break down in your water, and you end up drinking plastics. (especially in those really skinny bottles of water). Anyway, all in all, my reasons for drinking bottled water is for taste and convenience. Convenience being two things: convenience of a quick purchase, and easy to reuse.

Answer 9

No I don't. I know most people that do drink bottled water believe that their tap water is no good, tastes funny, or contains too much clorine for their taste (..but coincidentally did not bother them in previous years when bottled water wasn't sold at the corner store. It's all in the look for alot of them as well (clean living, Hybrid SUV for the 4.5 person family, only Diet Coke with their Big Mac, etc...).

Answer 10

I drink bottled water because we got notices on the door not to drink the tap and there's a good reason for that. If you turned on my tap water and put it in a glass you would see so many things floating around, it's really nasty. So yes, I drink bottled water every day and it's easy to take places because it's really hot where I live so I need water with me.

Answer 11

Yes, I drink bottled water for convience. I also recycle them though. But, recently I bought a bottle that I fill up with the filtered water from my fridge and I try to take that everywhere I go instead of using bottled water.