Message in a bottle: water costs more than money ...

One of Mayor Thorley's great statements during the water debate is that if you don't want to drink recycled water, buy bottled water.

An outrageous and arrogant statement to make.

Now comes evidence that her plan will actually produce unnecessary garbage and consume vast quantities of energy.

So much for her controversial project being the most energy efficient (of course not independently verified).

From the Age

February 11, 2006

BOTTLED water consumption, which has more than doubled globally in the past six years, is a natural resource that is heavily taxing the world's ecosystem, according to a new US study.

"Even in areas where tap water is safe to drink, demand for bottled water is increasing, producing unnecessary garbage and consuming vast quantities of energy," according to Emily Arnold, author of the study published by the Earth Policy Institute, a Washington-based environmental group.

The study said that demand for bottled water soared in developing countries between 1999 and 2004 with consumption tripling in India and more than doubling in China during that period. That has translated into massive costs in packaging the water, usually in plastic bottles made of polyethylene terephthalate (PET), which is derived from crude oil, and then transporting it by boat, train or by road."Making bottles to meet Americans' demand for bottled water requires more than 1.5 million barrels of oil annually, enough to fuel some 100,000 US cars for a year," according to the study.

"Worldwide, some 2.7 million tonnes of plastic are used to bottle water each year." Once the water is consumed, disposing the plastic bottles poses an environmental risk.

The study, citing the Container Recycling Institute, said that 86 per cent of plastic water bottles in the US end up as garbage and those buried can take up to 1000 years to biodegrade. In addition, some 40 per cent of the PET bottles deposited for recycling in the US in 2004 ended up being shipped to China.

See - Mayor Thorley gets it wrong.