The UAE has the 4th highest level of bottled water consumption in the world:

8 billion plastic bottled are consumed on average every year by the local population.

So, what can we do about it? Refill UAE offers a free and easy solution for preventing plastic pollution from single-use bottles at source.

The good news is that research has shown that 73% of us are concerned about plastic pollution

and 64 per cent of people surveyed said they would stop buying it if they could access tap water refills.

Join the Refill Revolution.

Together, we have the power to reach, influence and drive change to prevent plastic pollution at source!

1. Save Money.

Globally, the bottled water industry is expected to be worth $215.12 billion by 2025 [4] and in the UK they are spending more than $2.4 billion a year on the stuff [5]. That’s no surprise when you consider that they are buying around 3 bottles a week EACH every year. In the UAE we consume 450 bottles  per year per person and that is equivalent to 8/9 bottles per week per person!

Refilling your reusable bottle is an easy way to save money, because bottled water costs between 500-1000 times more than water from the tap! 

2. Reduce plastic consumption.

According to the Environmental Audit Committee in the UK, consumption of bottled water has doubled over the last 15 years, with over 7 billion plastic water bottles used each year. If everyone in the UK refilled just once a week, they’d prevent more than 340 million plastic bottles at source every year.

In the UAE alone we consume 8 billion of plastic bottled water per year! Can you magine the positive impact we would have if we would starting refilling our reusable bottles?

3. Help combat climate change.

It’s been estimated that plastic production and the incineration of plastic waste give rise globally to approximately 400 million tonnes of CO2 a year with bottled water being 900 times more carbon intensive than drinking tap water [6].

4. Save Water.

It takes over 8 litres of water to produce a single bottle, making it an incredibly inefficient use of resources, and that’s even before we’ve thought about flying it halfway across the world! [7]

5. Drink quality water.

In the UAE, we’re lucky to have some of the highest quality drinking water in the world.

However, many people still drink bottled water because they believe it not only tastes better but is better and safer than tap water. In reality, tap water is often more tightly regulated [8] and many people don’t know that all local bottled water brands in the UAE are actually tap water (read the label “pure drinking water” or “bottled water”)

Shockingly, a recent global study of bottled water brands found tiny plastic particles (microplastics) in over 90 per cent of samples [9].

That’s enough to make anyone reach for their reusable bottle and start refilling!

6. Protect the environment.

An appalling 700,000 plastic bottles are littered every single day in the UK [10]. Many of these are making their way into our oceans. Plastic bottles now make up one-third of all plastic pollution in the sea [11] and there are now over 159 plastic bottles for every mile of beach in the UK [12].

In the UAE, half of the camels die due to plastic consumption! Worldwide, the impact on our wildlife is becoming catastrophic – 100,000 marine mammals and turtles and 1 million seabirds are killed by plastic pollution annually…

References:

  1. Euromonitor International’s global packaging trends report.
  2. RECOUP (RECycling of Used Plastics Limited) cited in: House of Commons, ‘Plastic bottles: Turning Back the Plastic Tide’ – Source:  https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201719/cmselect/cmenvaud/339/33905.htm
  3. RECOUP (RECycling of Used Plastics Limited) cited in: House of Commons, ‘Plastic bottles: Turning Back the Plastic Tide’ – Source:  https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201719/cmselect/cmenvaud/339/33905.htm
  4. Grand View Research, Inc https://www.grandviewresearch.com/press-release/global-bottled-water-market
  5. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/jan/28/bottled-water-is-a-nonsense-fill-our-towns-with-drinking-fountains
  6. World Economic Forum, Ellen MacArthur Foundation and McKinsey & Company, ‘The New Plastics Economy — Rethinking the future of plastics’ (2016) http://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_The_New_Plastics_Economy.pdf
  7. Seas at Risk, Single-use Plastics and the Marine Environment: https://seas-at-risk.org/images/pdf/publications/SeasAtRiskSummarysingleUseplasticandthemarineenvironment.compressed.pdf
  8. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/health/news/9775158/Bottled-water-not-as-safe-as-tap-variety.html
  9. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/bsp/hi/pdfs/14_03_13_finalbottled.pdf
  10. Keep Britain Tidy (PKG0084A) cited in: House of Commons, ‘Plastic bottles: Turning Back the Plastic Tide’ Source: https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201719/cmselect/cmenvaud/339/33905.htm
  11. House of Commons Environmental Audit Committee Plastic bottles: Turning Back the Plastic Tide First Report of Session 2017–19
  12. The latest Beachwatch survey (2016, MCSUK)