Why Fiji Water Will Never Be 'Green'

I first encountered Fiji Water several years ago when I attended a conference held at a "resort" hotel. You know the type - kind of snooty, who have lately taken to levying a mandatory daily  "resort fee" to your bill so they can advertise lower room rates. But that's fodder for another post.

Anyway, in my room were several bottles of Fiji bottled water, with a note saying that if I preferred to drink this water, I would be charged $4 per bottle. My Scots ancestry came to the fore and I wondered why anyone would pay $4 for water when there was perfectly good tap water.  I was even more amazed when I discovered that Fiji was not just a moniker, but actually indicated the origin of the water.

Why would people have to drink water from Fiji, about 2,800 miles southwest of Honolulu, unless they lived in Fiji? Drinking bottled water in lieu of of perfectly good tap water is foolish enough, but bottled water from Fiji?

On NPR's The World earlier this week there was a piece on how Fiji Water is "going green", and will eventually become "carbon negative". The host interviewed a real lulu - "Fiji Water Girl" - who drinks nothing but Fiji bottled water and "can't live without it." Puhhh-leeze! She was ecstatic to hear that Fiji Water was "going green".

But the show's host also spoke with "Tap Water Girl", who correctly exclaimed, "It's creating a problem and then trying to fix a problem... as opposed to not creating a problem at all in the first place."

Fiji is now going "carbon negative"  in order to convince people that drinking expensive water from thousands of miles away is good for the planet. They are planting trees, using renewable energy sources, and rerouting their shipping routes so as to save energy and reduce carbon emissions. I applaud them (go to Fiji Green for more information). But can such an approach really produce a green product?

I have a problem with planting trees to offset carbon emissions. On a total "carbon emitted, carbon sequestered" basis, this no doubt can work, but what about the time factors? For example, if I purchase carbon credits for a plane flight to Europe, my carbon emissions occur in about half a day. But when does the carbon sequestration occur, and how long does it take for the trees to absorb the carbon my flight emitted? They do not do do so at the same time the flight occurs. And it's important to have the carbon sequestration happen as soon as possible relative to the carbon emission. If it takes 10 years for trees to sequester the carbon, how much additional global warming will have occurred because of my plane flight during those 10 years? And what happens when the trees die? The carbon is released as CO2.

If I am missing something, please enlighten me.

But there is another issue that transcends the "carbon negative" issue, one that Fiji can never address. Regardless of how "carbon negative" Fiji Water becomes, petroleum products are used to make and transport it.  Petroleum is far too valuable a substance to waste it on a product that we do not need and can obtain quite easily here at home. [Here's an article from today's New York Times about the environmental costs of shipping food around the world - thanks to Robert of Watercrunch]

And that, my children, is the reason why Fiji Water will never be green.

“Bottled water is a business that is fundamentally, inherently and inalterably unconscionable. No side deals to protect forests or combat global warming can offset that reality.” -- Michael J. Brune, executive director, Rainforest Action Network, New York Times, 7 November 2007

Comments

[robert]

The NYTimes has a good story today about the environmental cost of shipping groceries around the world which fits perfect with this post.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/26/business/worldbusiness/26food.html?em&ex=1209355200&en=24c7b0554935fcaa&ei=5087%0A

[Celia]

I understand that some are concerned with bottled water consumption when tap water is available. But good tap water isn't available everywhere! And personally, I'm increasingly concerned with drinking tap water due to the amount of chemicals we continue to find which have already caused mutations in fish... If we are to target water and use of petroleum, shouldn't we target all beverage manufacturers? Is Pepsi any less guilty of contributing to waste in landfills just because their beverage contain something other than water? Pepsi also ships their product all over the world. In my opinion, bottled water simply provides a healthy alternive to the soda/ juice industry. And fiji is certainly the most delicious water I've ever tried.

[Michael]

Dear Celia,

I appreciate it your comments. Yes, I drink bottled water whenever I think the tap water is suspect or unavailable. I am posting this from Baku, Azerbaijan, and since I do not know about the municipal water supply I am drinking bottled water (and of course, there is no guarantee that is safe here).

You may be surprised to learn that municipal water supplies in the USA are regulated more stringently than bottled water. There is no guarantee that the pharmaceuticals found in some tap water are not in bottled water. In fact, if you are drinking bottled water, you are likely drinking some bottled municipal water.

As for your claims about Fiji water, that's your choice. But if you must drink bottled water, there are certainly bottled water brands that do not come from halfway around the world - perhaps some locally-available brands. I would bet that you could not ID Fiji water in a blind test.

You are right about other beverage industries contributing to the landfill issue. I target bottled water because there is no usually no good reason to drink bottled water when when have the kind of tap water we have in the USA. I am also concerned about disinvestment in municipal drinking-water supplies.

And yes, I drink diet Coke and Pepsi. I also recyle my plastic and aluminum cans. Someone once criticized me for drinking bottled soft drinks and criticizing bottled water. My response: I will stop drinking soft drinks when they come out of my tap for vitually nothing. Enough said.