The Truth: Water Bottles

Yeah I got the memo on that last week .

PURCHASE, N.Y. -- Remember the Cola Wars? Get ready for the Bottle Wars.

PepsiCo Inc. today unveiled a bottle made entirely of plant material, which it says bests the technology of competitor Coca-Cola and reduces its potential carbon footprint.

The bottle is made from switch grass, pine bark, corn husks and other materials. Ultimately, Pepsi plans to also use orange peels, oat hulls, potato scraps and other leftovers from its food business.

The new bottle looks, feels and protects the drink inside exactly the same as its current bottles, said Rocco Papalia, senior vice president of advanced research at PepsiCo. "It's indistinguishable."

PepsiCo says it is the world's first bottle of a common type of plastic called PET made entirely of plant-based materials. Coca-Cola Co. currently produces a bottle using 30 percent plant-based materials and recently estimated it would be several years before it has a 100 percent plant bottle that's commercially viable.

"We've cracked the code," said Papalia.

The discovery potentially changes the industry standard for plastic packaging. Traditional plastic, called PET, is used in beverage bottles, food pouches, coatings and other common products.

The plastic is the go-to because it's lightweight and shatter-resistant, its safety is well-researched and it doesn't affect flavors. It is not biodegradable or compostable. But it is fully recyclable, a characteristic both companies maintain in their new creations.

Traditional PET plastic is made using fossil fuels, like petroleum, a limited resource that's rising in price. By using plant material instead, companies reduce their environmental impact. Pepsi says the new plastic will cost about the same as traditional plastic.

The company, based in Purchase, N.Y., said it has had dozens of people working on the process for years. While PepsiCo wouldn't specify the cost to research and design the new bottle, Papalia said it is in the millions of dollars.

It's one of several steps PepsiCo has taken recently to reduce its environmental impact. The company created a fully compostable bag for its SunChips line. It cut the amount of plastic in its Aqua-Fina bottle in 2009. And its Naked Juice line is in the midst of switching to a bottle made entirely of recycled plastic bottles.

PepsiCo says of its 19 biggest brands, those that generate more than $1 billion in revenue, 11 are beverage brands that use PET. The company says the packaging will cost roughly the same as it does today.

PepsiCo plans to test the product in 2012 in a few hundred thousand bottles. Once the company is sure it can successfully produce the bottle at that scale, it will begin converting all its products over.

 

i dont see much wrong with drinking from water bottles except most of them dont get recycled like the guy mentioned.

i read this in a magazine so not sure how true it is, but i heard its bad from women who are pregnant or planning on having children to drink tap water. The reason is because, with so many females taking birth control nowadays, there is an excessive amount of estrogen that gets urinated and not all of it can be filtered. According to the article, tap water today contains significantly more estrogen that it did twenty years ago. It is believed that the estrogen in the water affects the women consuming it since the number of babies born with genitalia disorder (such as a girl born with a shaft and a vag) has also increased in the past 20 years and this has occurred more frequently with women who claim to drink tap water.

just throwing it out there you can research it further if you like. i guess it makes no diff if bottled water is tapped anyway

another think to ponder about, water is not created or destroyed, so that water you drank this morning has been around for a long ass time. think about it

 

That explains why so many american men are overly emotional, pacifist sissies!!

 

OK Gotta jump in here.....
I'm a water treatment plant Operator at one of the largest drinking water treatment plants in the U.S.
Without getting into details, ( and I will if you want ), bottom line is that the safest water you'll ever get is from the public Utility. ( unless the Utility is in violation )
The more I learn about the bottled water industry, the more I just shake my head in amazement. 12oz bottle of water from the store - $1.25, 2000 gallons from your tap- $3.00. Add a 3 dollar latte' every morning to that and you could buy two new surfboards every year!!!!! ......Nice ones with bag, leash , extra fins, and deck pad!!!
We could debate about quality , but the only difference comes down to aesthetics... taste and odor issues which are separate from whether or not its safe. Since the Safe Water Drinking Act was passed by Congress, the standards are set very high for plant utilities, and I might note here that the bottled water does NOT have to meet these same standards !!!
If you are someone who goes around preaching the Green movement ( not that thats a bad thing...the Green movement that is...) and drink or buy bottled water, consider the amount of energy that was spent to make , ship, and recycle ( if your lucky ), that bottle, on top of the cost you paid. It really is insane !!!!
As far as the latest reports of estrogen and scripts drugs in the tap water I will say this.
Simple, if its in the tap water, its in the bottled water !!!!! duhhh !!
The good news is that the levels that have been discovered are very small. So small that we have only have been able to detect them because technology has finally made it possible. And in my professional opinion, when(and if) the levels do rise, we will be able to remove them, just like we do all the other bad stuff now. ( The levels of these contaminates are lower after treatment at my plant ).

 

This is all good info. In the summer I pretty much get my water fomr the tap at my place in Chincoteague. Tastes fine and drink a ton of it since I'm surfing constantly in the summer. I guess it depends on where you live. I wont drink city water. Yuk! I mostly drink 365 electolite enhanced, oxygenated water or Smart Water or Essentia because of better hydration and you need less of it plus it tastes great. When in the high mountains this gets really important because of high altitulde. 7 to 12000 feet. Angelfire water from Angelfire New Mexico is amazing with extra hydration and tastes better than anything I've ever had. But at $3 a bottle its pricey.
What about those bottled waters from Iceland, or Norway? How do they rate?

 

It's true, to clean the water they add a chemical, but that chemical is toxic so they add another chemical to break down that chemical, but that chemical is also toxic. So they add another chemical and that's only slightly toxic and the FDA approves it if it's under a certain percentage

 

There is a great documentary about this called Tapped. I think it was on netflix a while back. The other problem with the plastic bottles (the ones you don't throw away) is the presence of BPA phthalates in the polycarbonate that can leach out. These carcinogens are banned in most EU countries and Canada but are allowed in US plastics. At any rate a stainless steel container is a much safer bet.

 

i thought the BPA thing only applied to lexan bottles like Nalgene....

 

yeah,we're saving the planet,makes us feel good about ourselves

 

Yea the Nalgene bottles or any other hard plastic bottle likely has BPA in it. Most of the soft flexible one-time use bottles don't have BPA. Still a good idea though to avoid the plastic if you can.

 

I think you'all are missing the point. Paying for bottled water is like paying for air.

 

wait a minute your getting your air for free??? i have to pay for my air in fact i get charged for intake and outake.

 

I bought a reusable bottle at Target a few months ago and just use Britta. If you just look at the money part of it,the bottle I have is 24 ounces.Everytime I use to buy a bottle of soda or water it would cost me about a buck fifty x 3 per day is $4.50 a day x 5 days a week is $22.50 x 4 weeks=$90 month where tap water is almost free.