Bottleneck

Abstract

Although it's often claimed otherwise, the beverage industry is not the enemy of the water industry. In fact, bottled water is often the backstop when tap water is not available or acceptable. Common emergencies that can cause a surge in bottled water sales include service outages lasting any longer than a day, incidents that are becoming more common because water systems designed decades ago are facing new stresses from climate extremes. Maybe more common, though, are limited aesthetic events, often seasonal, in which the local tap water just tastes or smells bad.

Bottled water makes a nice Band-Aid, and it can be a lifesaver during emergencies and short-term quality challenges. But continued reliance on bottled water or water kiosks is a budget-killer, and it's often the communities that can least afford it that find themselves paying for packaged water. In fact, bottled water can cost upward of a thousand times more than tap water—but bad-tasting, bad-looking water drives consumers to use more expensive alternatives.

Besides the exorbitant cost compared with tap water, reliance on bottled water has many other downsides. The amount of energy and plastic materials that go into the production and transportation of packaged water is staggering. Plastic bottles are hopefully recycled, but reports are that less than 10% are made from recycled materials. Recently, questions have been raised about how microplastic particles from water bottles can affect human health, and how plastic debris and microplastic particles affect the environment.

Part of the challenge is that bottled water producers have advertising budgets, and in comparison, utilities more often struggle to establish good communication with their communities. Commercial operations can attack the quality of local services, instilling doubt and making you feel richer, sexier, or that you’ve made the better choice if you drink commercial water products.

Manny Teodoro (an author of this month's cover story) and his coauthors explain in The Profits of Distrust (Cambridge University Press 2022) that distrust of tap water doesn’t just reflect a purchasing decision—it's also an indicator of a citizen-consumer's political activity and societal expectations. Consumers who purchase bottled water or use drinking water kiosks tend to have less trust in government, while those who use tap water in their normal day-to-day lives show they have faith that their water is safe and they trust the agencies that produce and regulate it.

Reliability and transparency strengthen an organization's reputation, and it's up to all water professionals to reinforce the reputation of safe, great-tasting tap water—while keeping a case of bottled water in the closet, just in case. Please consider writing an article for Journal AWWA to share your water industry experiences and solutions by contacting me at [email protected].