Ditch The Plastic: Water Bottle
Updated: Mar 22, 2020
Welcome to 2020! A brand-new year to start building the brand-new you!
I myself am not a New Year resolution-maker, as I fall more into the "see problem, fix problem immediately" camp. However, I do like to start the year with intentions or goals that serve as points of focus and help me plan the year. In 2019, my goals were to start yoga teacher training (started!), commit to a more environmentally sustainable diet (done!), and go running at least three times a week (success!). My 2020 goals are still brewing, but I'm excited about the year. What are your goals?
This fall, a friend of mine told me that her 2020 goal is to reduce her consumption of single-use plastics. What a great idea - and one that we should all commit to!
You don't have to look far to see that single-use plastics are extremely damaging to the environment and are incredibly wasteful in general. Luckily, eliminating them from your daily life is easy to do and requires little effort. In fact, once you create the habit of reaching for your reusables, you'll wonder why you ever relied on single-use plastics in the first place!
This is how we're going to start the first weeks of 2020: This is the year that we ditch single-use plastics for good.
As we all know, changing a habit is freaking hard, man.
It takes concentration.
It takes dedication.
It takes baby steps.
So that's what we're gonna do - we're going to break this down to small little steps that you can concentrate on one at a time, until before you know it, you've achieved plastic-free nirvana.
Are you ready to get started??
Step One: The Water Bottle
Staying hydrated is the "thing to do" nowadays. But what are you drinking your water from? If you've been using single-use plastic bottles, consider some of these startling stats from the team behind Plastic Oceans (link):
According to the Container Recycling Institute, 100.7 billion (!!!) plastic beverage bottles were sold in the U.S. in 2014, or 315 bottles per person.
57% (57.4 billion) of those units were plastic water bottles. This is a 14x increase from 1996, the earliest year for available data (3.8 billion plastic water bottles sold in 1996).
The process of producing bottled water requires around 6 times as much water per bottle as there is in the container.
14% of all litter comes from beverage containers. When caps and labels are considered, the number is higher.
That's 100.7 billion plastic bottles being used each year - and when you consider the fact that the U.S. only recycles about 9% of its plastic (link), that means each year almost 92 billion plastic bottles are ending up in a landfill or in the ocean, where they won't decompose for thousands of years.
And that's just the United States - when you look at this plastic problem globally, and over time, the results are literally gargantuan.
Click here to see Reuters' graphic visualization of the size of our global plastic bottle use.
Someone needs to stop this madness. And we can.
So let's do something about that, shall we?
What To Use:
A reusable bottle with a watertight lid. This bottle doesn't have to be fancy. You can use a Nalgene bottle, or an old Mason jar, or that free swag bottle that was given out at your last company event. Chances are good that you can find a bottle on sale at Target.
Consider size and material: You may prefer a smaller or larger bottle, or one that keeps your water cold for longer. I have a large, 32 oz Nalgene that I like to use for longer hikes, flights, or any time that I know I'll need a bit more water with me, and I use a smaller 24 oz bottle for running around town. I also prefer glass or plastic bottles, as I'm not a fan of the feel and taste of a metal container. But that's just me - choose the container that feels best for you!
Hydration Tracker bottle - my coworker uses this bottle and loves it! Especially useful if you have trouble remembering to drink enough water throughout the day
How to Use It:
Every morning, put your bottle in your work bag and take it to work with you. Bring it to the gym after. Have lunch dates with it. Integrate it into your mental checklist before you leave the house: "keys-phone-wallet-water bottle". Make it your constant companion for a few days - everywhere you go, that reusable bottle goes too. After a while, it will become a regular part of your routine.
Some people may find it useful to have a separate water bottle at work, and another at home/gym. That way you don't need to tote a water bottle everywhere, and you don't need to remember to bring it to work with you!
Remember - forming the new habit is the hardest part. Be disciplined in keeping your water bottle with you and using it, instead of reaching for a plastic bottle!
How to Clean It:
Water bottles are very easy to clean with warm water and dish soap. If you want to be especially tidy, give it a scrub with a bottle brush.
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