Kudos to Bundanoon for banning bottled water! Let's hope many more follow!
An Australian town pulled all bottled water from
its shelves Saturday and replaced it with refillable bottles in what is
believed to be a world-first ban.
Hundreds of people marched through the picturesque rural
town of Bundanoon to mark the first day of its bottled water ban by unveiling a
series of new public drinking fountains, said campaign spokesman John Dee.
Shopkeepers ceremoniously removed the last bottles of water
from their shelves and replaced them with reusable bottles that can be filled
from fountains inside the town's shops or at water stations in the street.
"Every bottle today was taken off the shelf and out of
the fridges so you can only now buy refillable bottles in shops in
Bundanoon," Dee told AFP.
The tiny town, two hours south of Sydney, voted in July to
ban bottled water after a drinks company moved to tap into a local aquifer for
its bottled water business.
"In the process of the campaign against that the local
people became educated about the environmental impact of bottled water,"
said Dee.
"A local retailer came up with this idea of well why
don't we do something about that and actually stop selling the bottled water
and it got a favourable reaction," he said.
...
Activists say bottling water causes unnecessary use of
plastics and fuel for transport. A New South Wales study found that in 2006,
the industry was responsible for releasing 60,000 tonnes of gases blamed for
global warming.
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