Reduce, Reuse, Nalgene

There is a water fountain around almost every corner if you took the time to walk around campus. Most have the convenient water dispenser for water bottles which makes refilling a water bottle pretty easy. Even so it’s sometimes easier to grab a Dasani water at lower with a meal swipe. At home we recycle everything that is able to be recycled, which includes bottles. Here at Lafayette there are bins for plastic but sometimes the Dasani bottles end up in the trash. I’m very conscious about the amount of plastic waste people throw away and reducing the amount of plastic we throw away can make a huge difference.

 

People have to drink water; it’s a necessity for life. Students should have a water with them in before classes, during classes, and after classes. It’s always a good idea to stay hydrated and study shows that humans need about 64 fl ounces of water a day. Yes we get a little of that from the food we eat but we need more. To drink the total 64 fl ounces in Dasani bottles, one would need to consume 3-4 bottles. The other option is to drink 2 Nalgane bottles worth on water, which is again 64 fl ounces. Roughly 9600 Dasani bottles would be thrown away a day if every student consumed Dasani water and then threw the bottles in the trash.

 

I obviously can’t change the behaviors of people on campus but I can change my behavior. By using a nalgene bottle every day I prevent 4 bottles from being thrown away. For the rest of the semester, it is possible to save about 240 water bottles from ending up in landfills. It’s a small change for me and a small change overall on campus, but it’s a start.