Bottled Water: Do We Need It?

My family is a household of bottled water drinkers. Although we're adamant about using reusable water bottles (recently, we had three cases of 12 ounce bottles delivered to us as a promo and it was embarrassing to see so much plastic on our doorstep), we do get the eight gallon jugs delivered for our water cooler. I don't know why this came to be--perhaps college--the water from our taps was awful. Dirty and chalky tasting, we did anything to avoid drinking it. Whatever the reason, today I am a bottled water drinker. So, when I came across an article which stated that Americans drink way too much bottled water (something that's easily

avoidable since we have drinkable tap water readily available) I stopped to think. . . I was recently visiting a friend in Boulder, CO, and they drank their tap water. I did too--and it was great. When I go to Mammoth, CA in the winter, I drink their tap water--and it too is great. When I'm down at my parents house, I drink their tap water. So, why don't I drink my own? Am I biased against it for no good reason? The site that I stumbled upon, Treehugger, shows a video produced by Annie Leonard (and co-produced with five leading sustainability advocacy organizations, including Corporate Accountability International, Environmental Working Group, Food & Water Watch, Polaris Institute and Pacific Institute), "The Story of Bottled Water" which explores America's infatuation with the stuff. It shows the myths and cons from water companies that go into making Americans believe that they HAVE to have it. The article goes on to say that wasting mass amounts of money on bottled water is a world-wide epidemic. When talking about the BBC, located in England, it says: ". . .not only does the BBC spend nearly half a million pounds a year on bottled water for coolers, it also spends an undisclosed amount on bottled water for hospitality events - of which it held 103,000 last year alone - and staffers are allowed to order bottled water for any meetings lasting longer than two hours." As for the United States? Leslie Samuelrich of Corporate Accountability International is quoted as saying, "Cities and states are spending hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars on bottled water, and that's not to mention what's spent to deal with all the plastic bottles that are thrown out. It sends the wrong message about the quality of the tap. What if we instead spent that money supporting public water systems or preventing water pollution in the first place?" So yes, we want the best for ourselves and for our babies, but, living in America do we need to resort to bottled water? What do you think? Click on the video below, watch, and let us know your thoughts. . .