Bottled Water challenge - Essay Example

Compared to the traditional tap water, the cost of bottled water has remained relatively high and this has affected its acceptance in different parts of the society. The high cost of bottled water has been significantly felt by members of the low social class in the society whose income cannot enable them to use this category of water. Producers of bottled water have been accused of being at the forefront of environmental pollution and the entire supply chain of this commodity has been involved.

First, bottled waters are packed in plastic bottles that are produced from polyethylene terephthalate polymer (Yaqub, Hamid, Haseeb, Akhtar & Akram, 2014). This toxic chemical is derived from the end phase of petroleum refining and has massive implications to the environment. In order to sustain the demand for bottled water, the plastic packaging bottles must be produced in enough quantities. This involves the involvement of big petrochemical companies such as ExxonMobil and BP whose activities have affected the environment is significant ways (Huerta-Saenz, Irigoyen, Benavides & Mendoza, 2012).

Apart from the raw materials, the process of producing the bottles also require large amount of energy according to reports from the pacific institute. To package over 31 billion litres of bottled water demanded in the United States per year, a total of 17 million barrels of oil will be used and this will increase the level of greenhouse gas emission to the atmosphere. As compared to tap water that is transported through pipes sank underground, the transportation of bottled water require heavy vehicles, container ships and trucks.

These not only consume significant volume of oil but also release gallons of exhaust gases into the atmosphere. Bottled water that is transported to other continents therefore affects the aquatic ecosystem and leads to an increase in marine deaths due to increase in pollution. Plastic bottles are non-biodegradable and thus affect the