Bottled Water Shown to be more than 2000 times as energy intensive as tap water

Researchers Peter H. Gleick and Heather Cooley of the Pacific Institute have recently released a study titled “Energy implications of bottled water”, analyzing the energy footprint for the production and distribution of bottled water. There report, which appears in the February 2009 edition of 'Environmental Research Letters', chronicles the product life cycle of your average bottle of water and records the amount of energy expended at every stage of the production and transportation process.

For locally produced bottled water the manufacturing of the plastic bottle makes up the majority of the energy used, requiring about 4 MJ (megajoules) of energy to produce a small plastic bottle, whether it is 8 ounces or half letter, from polyethylene terephthalate (commonly recognized in the USA by its recycling code of ‘1’). However, ‘Spring’ waters, which are transported from a single source, can add as much as 5.8 MJ of energy, depending on the distance the bottle traveled. Other associated energy costs, such as water treatment, bottling, and refrigeration at the point of sale were found to be negligible in comparison.

In conclusion, the average energy cost for one bottle of water was found to be anywhere from 5.6 to 10.2 MJ, which outstrips the .0005 MJ of energy per liter needed to produce tap water, making the process around 2000 times as energy intensive. A quick calculation, care of unitconversion.org, shows this to be the energy equivalent of about .42 to 1.07 cups(US) of oil. Or, as the article points out:
“Given an annual consumption of 33 billion liters of bottled water in the US, we estimate that the annual consumption of bottled water in the US in 2007 required an energy input equivalent to between 32 and 54 million barrels of oil or a third of a per cent of total US primary energy consumption.”
For the consumer interested in making environmentally sustainable choices the implications of this study should be relatively clear. Next time, bring your own bottle, or at least try to buy local.