Day 26

FINALLY the day as come, the moment I've been waiting for, for 21 days I can finally have a water bottle and finish it and not have to refill it. Now I will be more aware of the harm not recycling water bottles has on the environment. After an exhausting trip to Wonderland, we had returned straight from the coach bus to Relay for Life at school. I had been so exhausted because I was so dehydrated, I spent the entire first hour of relay at the water fountain drinking water. At supper they were giving out water bottles, so I waited till Hushala was done her water bottle so she could give it to me and i could continue refilling that water bottle all night long. This assignment was really enlightening on the problems water bottles cause in the environment.

Day 24

I only have two more posts left and I can't wait before I finally get to have a water bottle and not have to refill it. The water bottles at my house have been filling up and I have to do my duty and finish them and recycle them so they don't end up in the trash because of my family. Now at least instead of just walking by a water bottle I will be concerned enough to pick it up and go recycle it, and I will encourage the other members of my family to do the same. If we all worked together and recycled then atleast the water bottles from our household will be recycled and turned into lightbulbs, or recycled into other items needed for our world.

Day 22

Today I'm going to Wonderland on a coach bus, where there is no place for me to refill my water bottle, and to add to the difficulties I'm extremely sick so I need water every two seconds. Since the coach bus only stops at one service centre which is usually the last service station before Toronto, I can't finish my water. If only coach buses had water fountains, or atleast the type of water you get in a doctors office, with the refillable huge jugs of water. At the service station I couldn't find a water fountain and I was not about to go fill my water in the restroom so I had to buy a water bottle. When we finally got to Wonderland I found a water fountain to refill my water bottle. Over the course of the night I kept running in between roller coasters to go fill my water bottle. At the park there was only one water fountain I could find and that was at the front of park and most of the rides were at the back so it was hard at times to go run, especially in the rain. On my way back to Ottawa I had bought another water bottle at Tim Hortins because I lost my water bottle at the end of my time at Wonderland.

Day 19

I can't wait till this assignment is done, I know this assignment is supposed to make me realize and learn to live a better life, but I cannot give up water bottles. Everytime I fill a water bottle at 10 pm I end up finishing it at 12 when i'm ready to go to bed and then I go and refill it, but then I finish that water bottle around 2 am and since i'll most likely be thirsty again I have to get up and go fill it. If these were the good old days, I would just open the drawer next to my bed and get a water bottle without even getting up. Once again today I left to school forgetting my refillable water bottle, I'm sick so I can't ask for a sip from a friend's water bottle and I can't keep asking to leave class everytime I'm thirsty. So I had to wait till my friend was done her slushie drink so I can refill it with water and drink from it. If I continue to forget my refillable water bottle then I'm going to have to wait around forever.

Day 17

There was a sale for water bottles and my father went and bought 7 cases of 24 pack water bottles. Everytime there is a sale on water bottles my parents buy more than 5 cases at a time. This is main reason why I always have a water bottle and I drink from them, then going and refilling it or drinking water from a glass. In my family at dinner you don't have a glass of water, you have a water bottle. Now that I'm doing this assignment I haven't gotten a water bottle this as made me lose interest in water. I barely drink water now I used to drink atleast 3 water bottles a day, but now I only have water once a day. Even though I refill the water from the water fountain I never liked the taste, I've been so accustomed to the taste from water bottles. Though I realize the water from water bottles is from tap, it still doesn't taste the same. Maybe the tap water Aquafina uses from detroit is just better tasting then the tap water in Ottawa.

Day 15

I never liked plastic reusable water bottles, so I am looking for a stainless steel water bottle, but the main reason I don't like those either is because they make the water have a metally taste. Another reason I don't like plastic reusable water bottles because I always see them leaking. So I tried to find a stainless steel reusable water bottle that didn't make the water have a metally taste. I found a reusable water bottle that says their bottles don't have a metally taste. This water bottle is the S'well water bottle created by Sarah Kauss. This unique water bottle didn't have the metally taste, the top of the bottle was big enough for ice cubes and the cap was tight enough that no liquid can escape. The bottle is a 17 oz water bottle, the reason why it doesn't have a metally taste is because other bottles have a lower quality stainless steel or is lined with plastic, so when the plastic wears away, you can taste the metal. The S'well bottle on the other hand is made out of the highest quality stainless steel possible, so it doesn't leach into the drink. In this bottle there are two walls of stainless steel, so it keeps hot drinks hot all day long without being hot to touch on the outside - and if you add ice cubes, it keeps your drink cold for two days. This reusable water bottle looks and feels good, its clean and functional, and its insulated to keep drinks cold and hot. If this reusable water bottle was sold in stores, I would defiantly go buy one.

Day 11

I need to actually buy a reusable water bottle instead of reusing my plastic one because the plastic one isn't even in the shape of a water bottle; it has been crushed into a small clump of plastic. If they sold more water bottles like these at regular stores instead of buying it online more people would be interested in using reusable water bottles. Reusable water bottles should be advertised more in the media, they should be placed strategically in T V shows, movies, and in the music industry. For example the Nuva Vodka is marketed quite efficiently in all the new and upcoming music videos, mostly in rap and hip hop. Usually shown in a club seen but sometimes seen elsewhere, those videos show it the drink can be drank at a party or even in a small social gathering. Since most people watch music videos and see this product they are more likely to get it. If reusable water bottles were more vastly marketed to the younger generation then in the future they could be more used then plastic water bottles.

Day 8

Over the past few days I've been collecting water bottles to recycle. I've been collecting the water bottles that haven't reached the recycling bin. Never have I ever collected this many bottles!! I now realize how easily water bottles can be forgotten and easily thrown in the trash. While driving to school I always see water bottles thrown on the ground and I wonder where they might end up, either in landfills or in the oceans, polluting the environment. Though I don't understand why companies don't just discontinue making plastic water bottles and make reusable ones. Or at least make a better system for water bottles by enforcing it more, most people either don't see the point or just dont care. If recycling became as important as waiting at a red light then more people would recyle and the world would be a better place. Also if people wanted to get rid of the use of water bottles then they should have more water fountains around the community. Water fountains should be enforced like hand sanitizer, hand sanitizer is everywhere, in the malls, hospitals, schools, and most public places, therefore water fountains should be easily accessible.  

Day 5

Today I went to McDonalds and my friends got food and drinks but all I wanted was water and the only water they had was in water bottles and due to this project I couldn't buy one or drink from one. So I had to wait till one of my friends had finished their drinks so I could bring it back to school and fill it up and finally drink from it. It was extremely inconvenient that I couldn't bring the water around with me in my bag and I had to eventually throw out my McDonald's cup. If I can't even survive without something as little as water bottles I don't understand how Colin Beaven and his family survived without all those things.

Day 1

It's always easy to say your going to quit something or to stop using something until you actually have to give it up. It's only been a couple of days that I should have given up water bottles. It's so easy to forget, everytime I'm thirsty I just reach for my water bottle and when that water bottle is done I unknowingly go and get another one, later realizing I'm not supposed to use water bottles and if I did I was supposed to refill them. Water bottles are convenient their easy to bring around, easy to buy when needed, in some places you don't have the luxury to refill your water bottle.

Statement of Intent

Colin Beavan, his wife, his 2 – year old daughter, and his dog live in the middle of New York City and are attempting to live without making any net impact on the environment. Therefore no trash, no carbon emissions, no toxins in the water, no elevators, no subway, no products in packaging, no plastics, no air conditioning, no TV, no toilets, etc. His purpose for this experiment was to show the world they could improve the quality of life and to end harm to the planet. Beavan’s No Impact Man motion is not something everyone can pursue, but from watching his documentary, we can at least try and adjust one thing in our lives. For the “No Impact” summative, I plan to give up using water bottles for the next three weeks. I will be using a designated water bottle and refilling it with water instead of opening a new one. I figured this would be most beneficial to reduce my carbon footprint since water bottles would be the main cause of my environmental unfriendliness. My family consumes an extraordinary amount of water bottles. We use water bottles as our main source of drinking water, we do not use tap and water is basically what we drink all the time. According to a 2001 report of the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), roughly 1.5 million tons of plastic are expended in the bottling of 89 billion liters of water each year. Besides the number of plastic bottles produced each year, the energy required to manufacture and transport these bottles to market severely drains limited fossil fuels. Bottled water companies, due to their unregulated use of valuable resources and their production of billions of plastic bottles have presented a significant strain on the environment. Americans buy more bottled water than any other nation in the world, adding 29 billion water bottles a year to the problem. In order to make all these bottles, manufactures use 17 million barrels of crude oil. That’s enough oil to keep a million cars going for a year. To produce one bottle of water, it took a quarter bottle of oil. For every six water bottles we use, only one makes it to the recycling bin, the rest are sent to landfills, or even worse end up as trash on the land and in rivers, lakes, and the oceans, these water bottles take hundreds of years to disintegrate. Recycling one plastic bottle can save enough energy to power a 60-watt light bulb for six hours. In my house, we recycle every bottle we use, and if a bottle has water in it but we don’t know how long that water bottle has been opened we pour it in the garden instead of wasting it down the drain. My family could not live without water bottles and neither can I, but for this summative I have to put my feelings aside and go through with it alone. The rules are fairly simple, I will re-use one of the water bottles previously opened and keep filling it up, if by chance that water bottle gets thrown out I will find another opened bottle and I will try and get steel bottle, or the plastic refillable ones. Getting through these 3 weeks is going to be pretty hard since there are water bottles everywhere I look, but I need to prove for this class, that if Colin and his family can go through what they did and prove a point to the world and themselves then it is worth it.