Australian town set to ban bottled water

[Blue_Tires]

Source: AFP

SYDNEY (AFP) – An Australian town is set to ban bottled water over concerns about its environmental impact, in what is believed to be a world first.

Bundanoon, a picturesque rural town with a population of just 2,000, was expected to vote heavily in favour of the move with a show of hands at a public meeting later.

"At the moment we've got a lot of community support behind it. We're confident the town is going to back it," said activist John Dee.

"We believe Bundanoon is the world's first town that has got its retailers to ban bottled water. We haven't found it anywhere else."

Local opinion was incensed when beverage company Norlex Holdings announced plans to tap an underground reservoir in the town, truck the water up to Sydney and then send it back in bottled form.

"The company has been looking to extract water locally, bottle it in Sydney and bring it back here to sell it again," said Dee.

"It made people look at the environmental impact of bottled water and the community has been quite vocal about it."

Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20090708/sc_afp/australiaenvironmentwater_20090708053338

[junior college]

1. Sounds reasonable

I have read that carcinogenic chemicals in the plastic bottle leech into the water of plastic bottles. And I see a lot of plastic water bottles floating in the ocean and in lakes or stuck in the seaweed on the shore.

http://googleads.g.doubleclick.net/pagead/imgad?id=CNDL_pDat4zxZhDYBRhPMgj2V3p3uN9Z6g

[Wabbajack_]

9. Sounds like fascism to me

[Lautremont]

10. Yeah, like the way they make you put mufflers on cars! Fascism!

It's just like Germany in the late 30s! Exactly the same!

[rpannier]

20. I'm sure that if you go back to when they were made mandatory you'd find Ronald Reagan doing

commercials against them

Concerned that we'd be looking back on the period before mufflers and wondering "Where our freedom went."

[Fumesucker]

36. They make you put mufflers on electric cars?

Who knew? :shrug:

:evilgrin:

Edited because I am a moran..

[Hissyspit]

13. Why can't I have my own personal nuclear warhead? I want my own personal nuclear warhead.

How dare anyone tell me I can't have one.

[Wabbajack_]

17. A nuke is not a bottle of water, save the sarcasm

It's not the mayor's bizness if I want to drink bottled water.

[Hissyspit]

19. Wasn't sarcasm.

If the plastic in bottled water or the manufacture of it/bottling process poses a threat to a community, it should possibly be regulated.

Calling it fascism is absurdist, so I used an absurdist example.

[Divine Discontent]

46. you are....

too good with the replies! ha...

good retort. absurdity begets absurdity.

[Nihil]

27. On the other hand ...

> It's not the mayor's bizness if I want to drink bottled water.

If it affects the people who are his responsibility, it *IS* his
business to act. He was elected by those people to act on their
behalf and that is precisely what he is doing here.

The fact that you are stupid, arrogant and selfish isn't his problem,
it is yours.

:eyes:

[Wabbajack_]

33. You are the "stupid" one if you

think the plastic bottles that are everywhere are "hurting" people. Breathtaking I'm seem to be in the minority on this thread that people have a right to drink what they want.

[kestrel91316]

44. This isn't Libertarian Underground, BTW.

[Nihil]

47. Thanks for proving your ignorance (yet again)

> You are the "stupid" one if you think the plastic bottles that are
> everywhere are "hurting" people.

You are so full of shit that they should reprocess you and not only
power a major city but be able to fertilise the best part of Nebraska
with the leftovers.


> Breathtaking I'm seem to be in the minority on this thread that
> people have a right to drink what they want.

Well at least that's one good thing from this thread: it suggests that
there are far more concerned people around than I'd thought previously.

[Chulanowa]

21. Denying you the right to fuck up your neighbors is Fascism, damn right!

You should be free to do whatever you want, to whoever you want! Viva Liberatarianism!

[kestrel91316]

43. Yeah, because only fascists think drinking water shouldn't be sold for profit.

I assume you would be as incensed at the idea of prohibiting air from being bottled and sold to people living in polluted areas.

[canetoad]

2. As someone who has never

purchased water in a bottle, I applaud this effort.

I heard the Mayor interviewed on the radio yesterday, seems the town is pretty much behind the move.

[handmade34]

3. good move. we must ban it and refuse to let corporations

exploit our ground water...

Coca - Cola Admits That Dasani is Nothing But Tap Water http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0304-04.htm

What's in Your Bottled Water? FDA Wants You to Know http://www.cnbc.com/id/31799838

Bottled Water, Get the Facts http://www.fwwatch.org/water/bottled

"Bottled water is not safer than tap water. Bottled water creates mountains of garbage and causes other major environmental problems. Bottled water is thousands of times more expensive than tap water. Bottled water companies mislead communities into giving away their public water in exchange for dangerous jobs"

[depakid]

4. This just in: NSW Premier Nathan Rees bans bottled water

NSW Premier Nathan Rees has announced an immediate ban on all departments and agencies buying bottled water, including supplies for water coolers. It was the first step in a Government campaign to reduce significantly the consumption of bottled water in the community, Mr Rees said.

In a double blow for the bottled water industry, the sleepy Southern Highlands hamlet of Bundanoon voted to ban bottled water, just hours after the NSW Government announced its boycott. "These plastic bottles are everywhere," Mr Rees told reporters yesterday. "It's not just the direct plastic bottle that causes the physical reality in our local environment.

"Bear this in mind. You take a 600ml plastic bottle, 200ml of oil has gone into its production. "That's leaving aside the C02 that comes from transporting it around the place." Bottled water has been banned in ministerial offices at Governor Macquarie Tower in Sydney's CBD since Mr Rees became Premier last year.

At a community meeting last night, Bundanoon locals overwhelmingly supported Australia's first ban on commercially bottled water, already agreed to by businesses in the town. Local businessman and Bundy on Tap organiser Huw Kingston said almost 400 people turned up to the Bundanoon Memorial Hall, with only two casting dissenting votes.

The voluntary ban has been triggered by concerns about the carbon footprint associated with bottling and transporting the water. Free water fountains will be installed in the NSW village, south-west of Sydney, to replace the bottled water.

More: http://www.theage.com.au/environment/water-issues/nsw-premier-nathan-rees-bans-bottled-water-20090709-ddyh.html

[2Design]

5. I don't get this - drinking water is better than soda or beer - there are a lot more of

those containers thrown on the side of the road - lets band soda and beer instead

[lindisfarne]

7. I've never seen beer in a plastic bottle.Litterers will litter,regardless.We might as well ban milk

too.

[rpannier]

8. It's more common if you live overseas to see beer and some other distilled spirits in plastic bottle

In Japan and Korea you can buy beer in plastic bottles -- Cass and Hite are two that immediately come to mind

[lindisfarne]

12. Live & learn. If wine can come in a cardboard box, I guess beer can come in a plastic bottle.I can't

stand water in plastic bottles (I can taste the plastic); I can't imagine beer from one.

[depakid]

14. Never seen spirits in a plastic bottles in Oz

Just glass.

Can't even imagine beer in plastic. Gak.

[Art_from_Ark]

32. I've never seen beer sold in plastic bottles in Japan

I've always seen it sold in cans or glass bottles. But you can buy 20 different types of tea in plastic bottles, not to mention various soft drinks.

[northzax]

38. I bought beer in a plastic bottle just the other day

I was at a game. happens all the time.

[Art_from_Ark]

41. You bought your beer in Japan?

:shrug:

[northzax]

42. I have, yes

Butnot this particular time, no.

[WriteDown]

16. What's weird is their is bottled water, soda, etc in Sweden...

but the place is spotless. Same as in some parts of Canada.

[No Elephants]

25. Sounds like a "bottles don't litter, people do" argument. Nothing weird about

different cultures. However, we've been trying anti-litter campaigns for decades, from public relations to fines, and our people still litter. One definition of insanity is repeating the same conduct and expecting a different result.

[2Design]

30. yea - americans are slobs so many times - I watch people

leave trays and other items on a table or throw it on the ground when their is a garbage bin within walking distance or even right next to their table - I am incredulous how other assume someone should pick up after them

[northzax]

37. well, in many communities

you cannot turn on the tap and get beer for fractions of a cent a gallon (if you know of one, please let me know, I need to move)

[ro1942]

6. great

it is killing the oceans

[troubledamerican]

11. The film "The Corporation" shows RW think-tankers who want ALL water privatized

Just wait till the next Neocon administration

[Teaser]

15. bigger.fish.to.fry

.

[Mike K]

18. Unnecessary

Anyone who doesn't like the taste or smell of tap water need only buy a BRITA pitcher which transforms ordinary tap water into filtered water which is as clean, crystal clear, pure and odorless as any bottled water. This is not only my opinion but has been the subject of laboratory research conducted by Consumer Digest magazine.

I've been using a BRITA pitcher since I read that article back in the early 1980s and I've saved quite a bit of bottled water money, not to mention the positive effect of not putting thousands of plastic bottles into the environment.

[mamaleah]

22. What about soda and juice bottles?

Are there not many of those too?

[northzax]

39. does your faucet bring you juice or soda?

cause if so, sweet.

[truthisfreedom]

23. Cute.

[No Elephants]

24. Following lindisfarne's point, if wine can come in a cardboard box, why can't beer, water and soft

drinks? Isn't cardboard both re-cyclable and biodegadable? And it does not have carcinogenic chemicals that will leach into the beverage.

But then, I guess, forests have to come down to produce the cardboard.

We so should have started worrying about the planet much sooner. Not as though the problems have not been popular knowledge for at least 50 or 60 years, give or take.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques-Yves_Cousteau

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Sagan

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silent_Spring

[kentauros]

26. The problem with "boxed wine" is the use of a type of packaging

called "Tetra Pak" with aseptic processing. The layered paper-product is difficult to recycle due it being a layer of paper, aluminum and plastic. Get one of those boxes of soup, ricemilk or fruit juice sometime and try to tear that layered stuff apart. It can be recycled, through something called "hydrapulping" but such facilities are not available everywhere.

[northzax]

40. and wine isn't carbonated

well most wine isn't. tetra pak isn't designed for carbonation.

[Vidar]

28. Good move. We need to put an end to the corporate water wars.

[Robb]

29. I wonder if this is more about the water rights than the bottles.

I'm going to look into it further, but being in Colorado that's always my first guess -- enlightened self-interest. :)

[Wednesdays]

31. K&R

:kick:

[Violet_Crumble]

34. I already refuse to buy bottled water...

I mean, why go and pay for something that I can get for free from the tap?

Kudos to Bundanoon for the ban...

[EndersDame]

35. I bottle my own water The local water taste like swimming pool water

[iris27]

45. The university where I work started this last year.

The only effect I've really seen is that the same people who used to come through the bookstore to buy water, now buy soda, juice, or coffee. There's still a container to be thrown away, they're just consuming a less healthy beverage.