Is Fiji bottled water really carbon negative?
At the end of last year, Fiji announced it's plans to offset its carbon emissions by 120%, so that -- according to their website -- drinking Fiji will "result in a net reduction of carbon in the atmosphere." While that sounds great and all, I'm finding Fiji's claims a little hard to swallow. How about you?The truth is that Fiji has done more than most bottled water companies to lessen its impact on the environment, but still: bottled water is bottled water. Despite their buying huge carbon offsets and shipping their water on container ships that are already destined for US ports -- bottled water is simply not as green as drinking from the tap. According to estimates from Triple Pundit, it takes almost 6 times more water to produce and transport a bottle of Fiji than the bottle actually holds. No matter how they offset it, that is not a very green equation.
I've got to hand it to them, they've come up with a pretty good marketing tool -- but seriously. If Exxon bought 120% offsets for it's operations, would we believe that filling up with Exxon results in a net reduction of greenhouse gases?
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
5-08-2008 @ 4:55PM
TheSpuddy said...
Hmmm, good points. I think we can agree that if you are comparing bottled water company (insert name here) vs. Fiji bottled water, perhaps Fiji is the better option when it comes to carbon footprint.
But I agree that you are never gonna beat the great (almost) free water the comes out of the tap (chemicals and all). It's still a lot better than what many people around the world have.
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5-09-2008 @ 12:20PM
ThatHollie said...
Neither your column, nor the one linked to at CNNMoney.com, presents a constructive alternative as far as what Fiji should be doing instead of what they are doing now. (Perhaps you think they should just go out of business, but that's just ridiculous.) As long as people want to buy bottled water, I see no reason to vilify companies just because they are willing to sell it to them.
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