Despite having some of the highest quality tap water in the world, over just the last 15 years, the consumption of bottled water in the UK has doubled, with people in the UK working their way through an estimated 7.7 billion plastic water bottles each and every year. In fact, 60% of the plastic bottles used in the UK are water bottles, and sadly, almost half of these bottles are not recycled. This amounts to around 15 million plastic bottles being littered, incinerated, or ending up in landfills daily.
National Refill Day, taking place on Wednesday 19th June and brought to you by City to Sea as part of their award-winning Refill campaign, aims to both raise awareness of this national and global crisis and hopefully encourage the United Kingdom to cut back on its consumption of single-use plastic bottles. Passionate about making carrying a refillable water bottle the new social norm, the Refill campaign is designed to make reducing plastic pollution easy and attractive, with a goal of introducing Refill Stations to every high street in every city in the not too distant future. If every Refill Station was used just twice a week, the UK would consume 14 million fewer bottles a year. No matter what the Danish-Norwegian pop group Aqua might have led you to believe, life in plastic isn’t fantastic!!!
Whether you’re dedicated to helping to save the planet or you’d simply like to be able to walk barefoot along our beautiful coastlines without stepping in litter, cutting back on single-use plastic bottles is an easy way you can do your part to make the world a more inhabitable place for future generations. After all, it’s estimated that for every mile of beach in the UK, there are over 159 plastic bottles.
No matter the reasons why you choose to purchase single-use plastic bottles, there’s no denying that it’s destructive to the planet. Not only does our consumption of single-use plastic water bottles produce up to 233,000 tonnes of C03 emission a year – roughly the weight of 52,000 elephants in C03, but around 100,000 marine mammals and turtles and 1 million sea birds are killed by plastic pollution every year. The average seafood consumer in the UK also ingests around 11,000 plastic particles every year, so if you’re drinking bottled water for the health benefits, you might want to reconsider.
But what can you do to get involved? The simplest thing you can do is to purchase a reusable bottle or reuse an empty bottle you have lying around the house. Refill has teamed up with Chilly’s to create their very own modern and stylish Chilly’s X Refill bottle which you can purchase over on their website. In fact, for a limited time only, if you subscribe to Refill’s newsletter, you can get £5 off the retail price of this bottle.
You can also download the Refill app to help you find your nearest Refill Station, run an event or action day in your local area, sign up as a Refill Station, or volunteer and support a Refill scheme in your local area.
For further information on this incredible campaign and how you can get involved, visit https://refill.org.uk/national-refill-day/ now.
