By now, we all know that single-use plastic is bad.
But seeing how so much produce is housed in the stuff – be it fruit, crisps or drinks – it can seem like a daunting mission trying to cut down.
A good place to start is single-use plastic bottles – if we all stopped buying mineral water in bottles with our lunch, and instead filled reusable water bottles with tap water or filtered water from coolers, we’d be making a headway on the problem.
It’s all well and good saying we’ll do that though, but many of us human beings excel in procrastination (*waves*) and need a bit of a kick up the butt to actually get things going.
To help us out, reusable water bottle company S’well has launched the Million Bottle Project, a sustainability program to actively encourage people to decrease their use of plastic bottles.
By 2020, S’well aims to help displace 100 million plastic bottles from entering landfills, waterways and other undesirable locations.
To do this, they need our help.
Individuals use, on average, 167 plastic water bottles every year, with less than a third of those finding their way into a recycling plant.
If you live in a UK city, it’s quite easy to turn a blind eye to the destruction that our single-use bottle habit is causing, but take a trip to seemingly paradise destinations like Sri Lanka, Thailand or Bali and there’s no way of ignoring it.
A few years ago, I turned the corner on a picturesque trek to a ‘secret’ beach on the south coast of Sri Lanka to find a huge pile of plastic water bottles.
There was no way of rescuing all of them – no doubt they’re in the sea by now.
On a trip to Bali a couple of years ago, I was warned by a friend that ‘the beaches are nothing like Instagram’ and she was right – they were strewn with plastic and other debris, which no amount of beach clean-ups made a dent in.
Locals in countries like the ones mentioned above often don’t have the education and have no idea what damage they’re doing to their own slices of paradise, but we do. So, we need to do our bit.
And we need to do it fast – if we don’t act now, experts warn that the amount of plastic in the ocean will treble by 2025.
If you’re not a water baby and this doesn’t bother you, then think about the fish on your plate.
Marine creatures are consuming plastic, thinking it’s food. They’re then farmed, and end up being eaten by humans, who are unwittingly eating their own trash. Grim.
Take S’well’s pledge to reduce your consumption of single-use plastic bottles here.
Every little helps.
And you can start by treating yourself to a super cute reusable water bottle.