I found this book to be highly informative, putting a human face on a series of complex issues without simple answers. The book itself draws uncertain conclusions and leaves ultimate decisions in the hands of individual consumers and the masses, both localized and globalized. I found myself armed with new factual information with which to present my own arguments and with which to make my own personal decisions, including many surprising tidbits that were truly eye-openers. Despite a lengthy bibliography, an early factual error (on page 21, where the City of Boston was said to draw its water from the Connecticut River) led me to more closely question other factual information with which I may be less familiar. That minor annoyance aside, I would suggest Bottlemania as recommended reading for anybody who consumes water - and that is every one of us.

Although many reviewers have commented on the author as an environmentalist, she is really opposed to corporations developing and marketing something as basic to nature as water. She finds this essentially offensive, as if a large corporation might automate the raising of organic bean sprouts and deliver them to grocery stores. It takes the environmental revolutionary and the Vermont coop out of the equation. If everyone drinking sugar-laden sodas were to switch to bottled water, as many have, the health of these people would improve. Somehow, the back-to-nature mentality of the author does not allow for the fact that modern, corporate processing of water results in fine water. If a corporation markets and sells something, creating employment and wealth, environmentalist paranoia dictates that the corporation must be selling poison.

Bottlemania: how water went on sale and why we bought it
By
Elizabeth Royte
(Published by Bloomsbury USA, New York - First edition 2008)

What is our future if water, life's most vital necessity, becomes a commodity - to be sold for profit - rather than a shared commons? In this fast-moving, well-researched book, Elizabeth Royte describes the astonishing increase in sales of bottled water in the U.S.; this, despite the fact that tap water costs anywhere from 240 to 10,000 times less than bottled water, is more strictly regulated, and comes out evenly in blind tests against the top brand names.

Royte raises two main questions: "One has concrete answers: what are the physical differences between tap water and bottled, and what is water bottling actually doing to the environment and the local communities? The other questions are more abstract: Even if bottled water makes sense, for health or other reasons, even if it is harmless, is it ethical to profit from its sale? If we believe water is a basic human right - such as freedom from persecution or equality before the law - then why would we let anyone slap a bar code on it?

In addressing the first question, Royte describes the struggles of the residents of Fryeburg, Maine - population 3,000 - to stop Poland Springs, owned by Nestle, from continuing to extract water from their local, pristine watershed to supply their bottling plant in the nearby town of Hollis. The struggle has been ongoing for over four years and it is tearing the town apart. Some residents claim that their wells are running dry but find this hard to prove against Nestle's array of experts that claim they are not over-pumping. Other residents are concerned with the effects of water drawdown on those creatures that depend on the watershed streams and springs for their survival. Others question the right of a powerful multinational to override the wishes of a small community to maintain their lifestyle. And yet other town residents are amenable to what they perceive as improvements brought about by the bottling company. Sadly, the result is a small town divided into factions, with the outcome still unclear.

Royte explains the reasons for the skyrocketing sales of bottled water. Unbelievably, from only 1990 to 1997, U.S. sales of bottled water increased from $115 million to $4 billion. Clever, multimillion dollar marketing stressed the need to drink at least eight, eight fluid ounce bottles per day; the "chic appeal" of being seen taking sips from your individual bottle - a sign of a busy life style that precluded time out for relaxation; and the convenience of having a bottle in hand rather than having to seek out a water fountain or office cooler. The increase was also due to an often-overlooked invention - PET plastic that enabled the manufacture of stronger, lighter and potentially recyclable bottles.

Unfortunately, this craze for bottled water is placing ever more stress on the environment. As explained by Peter Gleick of the Pacific Institue, the energy required for the manufacture, transport and disposal of each bottle is equivalent to filling one quarter of the bottle with oil. And only 15% of these bottles get recycled. Most are buried in landfills or are burned in incinerators.

According to Royte, in 2006, 44% of bottled water sold in the U.S. came from municipal supplies. This is certainly less harmful than pumping from aquifers although the bottling companies deny any harm and claim that they pump at sustainable rates - after all, this is in their own interests. Even though the bottlers claim that they only remove .02% of the total annual groundwater withdrawal, we must remember that this water is permanently removed from the watershed, unlike the local utility that discharges used water into the same watershed.

With public thirst for bottled water on the increase, the water multinationals are fanning out all over the U.S. in search of fresh sources. So far, the towns are reacting like deer caught in the headlights and seem unable to promulgate ordinances prohibiting outsiders from mining their water for gain. The one exception (there may be others since the book was published) is the tiny hamlet of Barnstead, N.H. which, in 2006, was the first municipality in the U.S. to ban extraction of their water for sale elsewhere.

The discovery of the disinfection properties of chlorine, and the commencement of its widespread use in drinking water, in 1920, was the start of the successful public control of drinking water, and the setting of standards for maximum levels of various pollutants - standards and pollutants that are constantly being revised.

One of the more ominous threats to drinking water quality is global warming. Heavier storms that are becoming the norm wash excesses of pollutants of all kinds into surface and ground waters, and overwhelm sewage treatment plants. Among these pollutants are atrazine, a widely-used herbicide that can cause birth defects and whose use is being enhanced by the ethanol boom; and 0157:H7, a virulent strain of E coli, originating in cattle and that does not respond to chlorine.

Eliminating these dangerous contaminants, and others, and complying with strict federal standards is a monumental task for the purveyors of public drinking water. On the whole, throughout the U.S., municipal water is safe to drink. However, Royte does suggest the use of individual filters to protect the very young and the very old, or those with immune-deficient systems.

Pepsi's Aquafina and Coke's Dasani are both drawn from municipal sources. However, bottled water, whether drawn from municipal sources or local aquifers does not have to comply with the stringent regulations imposed on municipal water. And despite its intensive marketing, blind tests generally fail to differentiate between bottled and tap water.

In times of severe storms that are becoming more frequent, as already mentioned, bottled water could be the only alternative. But, in the absence of such disasters, Royte is a firm advocate of using public supplies. As she so eloquently states: "Switching to bottled water isn't something I'm willing to contemplate at this point: it's expensive, it's heavy to haul around, and the production and disposal of all those bottles can't be good for the planet... Opting out of public water in favor of private isn't going to help preserve - or improve - municipal water supplies, but preserve them we must: too many people can afford to drink nothing but."

Review by Marian H. Rose, PhD
Croton Watershed Clean Water Coalition

I was pre-disposed to liking this book based upon its full title alone: "Bottlemania: How Water Went on Sale and Why We Bought It". Indeed, I look at people with their fancy, expensive bottled waters and chuckle. Tap water in most US cities is good enough for me. So I sat down with "Bottlemania", enitrely prepared to enjoy a roasting of the bottled water industry and (in my opinion) the foolish people who buy most of its wares.

I quickly realized that "Bottlemania" was long on strident advocacy and short on provable facts. Ms. Royte apparently sees herself as something on an Ida Tarbell, the early 20th Century "muckraker" whose "exposes" of Standard Oil roused the nation's indignation. Like Tarbell, however, Royte plays fast and loose with what she sets forth as "facts". For example, on pasge 84, the naked claim that ". . . nearly 40% of the nation's rivers and streams are too polluted for fishing and swimming, to say nothing of drinking." Says who? Royte provides no specific reference, no support for this remarkable claim. I spent some time trying to find a credible source and could not.

The Appendix supplied is " . . . a list of internet sources for more information on the topices covered in this book, as well as information on how to learn more about water quality in your area". Most of the sources provided are advocacy groups of one kind or another, not impartial purveyors of facts. Royte's bibliography consists mostly of newspaper and magazine articles.In short, Royte has approached her subject with an axe to grind and grind it she does.

While Royte does trot out alleged facts here and there from credible objective sources, I would not trust her reporting because of the adversarial edge she displays toward bottled water purveyors specifically, big corporations in general and, overall, the free market system.

The final chapter is a hodge-podge of practical suggestions for water conservation, a good idea no matter what your politics, and substantial government intervention to keep you from "wasting" water, including of course high taxes on water. We are to at less meat because "the water footprint of a four-ounce hamburger produced in California is 616 gallons". In keeping with Royte's style, no source is suggested for this alleged "fact". Thanks are given to Royte to "anti-globalization" groups.

It is really sad, I think, that Royte could not be bothered with supporting her arguments with attributable facts, because her basic points are valid. The unrestricted exploitation of water resources for water to bottle and sell at enormous profit is bad on the face of it. One needn't resort to the unprovable to prove this point. Royte's conclusion in the closing pages that "bottled water is often no better than tap water, [but] its environmental and social price is high . . ." is indisputable.

In sum, this could have been an excellent book and a substantial contribution to public discourse on an important subject. Instead is is a sensationalist tract filled with unprovable, agenda driven claims masquerding as "facts".

This book is written for those who already and unreservably believe in the "environmentalist" religion. It is not for those secularists who prefer that all claims be supported by provable facts.

Royte makes her beliefs clear in a single sentence: "[i]f someday I find myself wanting to buy bottled water, I will do it as an informed consumer, someone who knows tht the images on the label may not reflect an ecological reality, that part of its sticker price may be landing in the pockets of lawyers and PR flacks, that profits probably aren't benefiting those who live near the source, and that the bottle and its transportation have a significant carbon footprint".

Guess what, Ms. Royte, parts of the sticker price of your book goes into the pockets of lawyers and PR flacks. And it is unlikely that the people who cut down the trees used to make the paper your words are printed on don't profit significantly from their efforts. Speaking of carbon footprints, how about the energy consumed in making the paper and ink used in your book, the printing and transportation of it, the air conditioning in the stores where it is sold and so on?

Many of Royte's points are valid, but her sensationalist style strips her of credibility. In the final analysis, this just another anti-capitalist, anti-democratic screed. Too bad, because buried under all the left-wing rhetoric is a valid point: for the most part bottled water in the United States is wasteful silliness.

Jerry

Anyone reading this book will hopefully pick up their plastic water bottles and heave them into the recycling bin. This is an excellent piece identifying both sides of the contentious issue of the right to water and who should use it. This book is worth reading for anyone in the developed world.

After reading this book, I will most certainly think twice about asking for bottled water again. While I suspected that bottled waters were 1000% profit companies, I had no idea what the consequences could be of their actions. It makes for disturbing consideration.

I found the writing somewhat convoluted and often wandering off the point I felt the author was trying to make. Nevertheless the book is an essential read to enlightening us about our (now revealed) indulgent habits.

I for one am making a change in my habits. Yes, it has to be tap water from now on, but via a filter that I can control. Hopefully each person who follows suit will actively persuade their governments to improve their local water supply systems.

I love this book.!! Anyone who is interested in the subject of bottle vs tap water must read it! Well done!

As another reviewer mentioned, I kind of expected this book to have more of a global focus than it does, but what it does cover of the US it covers very well. I was especially impressed with the thorough comparisons of bottled and tap waters, and how balanced the author's approach was when looking at them; because it's written in first-person you can ultimately tell what her opinions are, but she spends ample time talking about how she appreciates both sides of the issues. Echoing the mentioned sentiment that "water is the new oil" I think it's in everyone's best interest to read books such as this one.

Journalist Elizabeth Royte uncorks America's obsession with bottled water in BOTTLEMANIA, assessing the financial, environmental and ecological ramifications of this practice.

How safe is your tap water? How "pure" is that bottled aqua you are sipping from? How much water goes into producing and bottling that bottle? How did Americans come to the idea that sipping bottled water was somehow safer and healthier? How do we reconcile corporate interests with local environmental concerns?

Royte shows both sides of the issues without coming off as some tree-hugging environmentalist. She struggles with many of the same issues on the level of her own personal water consumption. BOTTLEMAINIA can be slow-sledding at times through some of the scientific discussion and its narrative of local meetings has all the thrill of waiting in line at the DMV.

Nevertheless, you may not view that bottle of Poland Springs quite the same way after reading BOTTLEMANUIA. In fact, reading BOTTLEMANIA may cure us of our "bottle-mania"!

On a recent visit to Old Faithful at Yellowstone National Park, the ranger commented that the water shooting out of the geyser was between five hundred and eighteen hundred years old. Does water have age? Yes, it does, and Elizabeth Royte's wonderful new book, "Bottlemania", explores water in its many aspects....how it is so readily available for exploitation, its packaging, its increasing relevance in our lives, and much more. As a natural resource, a commodity, a convenience and a company investment, Royte tells it all. If one thought oil was the resource du jour, stick around...water will trump it.

This is really two books in one... the author spends a good deal of time in Fryeburg, Maine, where the Nestlé corporation is doing battle with town residents regarding the extraction of water from (literally) underneath them. The battle is joined. Can the behemoth be stopped? But this is a more personal book for most of us, as well. Why do we drink so much bottled water when tap water is just as good, if not preferable? Again, look no farther than "Bottlemania" for some answers. There can be oil substitutes, but water is irreplaceable and the coming years could be a test of national will regarding its use and preservation.

Royte is an exceptionally good writer. She keeps the focus just where it needs to be and her narrative is compelling. Growing up, I never gave water a thought. Now I do. I highly recommend "Bottlemania" for this comprehensive look at water...our staff of life.

The title is cute and catchy and implies the book is a lightweight screed about the erstwhile evils of drinking bottled water. Yes, the initial starting point for Ms. Royte's inquiry was asking some simple questions about the impacts and equities of a corporation bottling huge quantities of Maine springwater. But this is an important environmental book, in the same league as "An Inconvenient Truth".

This is because Ms. Royte's simple questions about bottled water lead her and us on an exploration of a whole hidden world of our water and sanitation resources and infrastructure that lies behind our taps. How does bottled springwater differ from tap water in terms of harmful biological and chemical contaminants? How did the fad of chugging water out of throwaway plastic bottles catch on? Where does our tap water come from? How is it treated? Is that necessarily good for us? What is happening to the watersheds that all of us depend on? How can they be protected? How are water and sanitation systems interrelated? Are these groundwater and freshwater issues affected by other environmental trends, like global warming? And so on.

Like Ms. Royte, you will probably come to the end of this brisk, readable work knowing a lot more about your own water and sanitation then you did when you began and have a much better appreciation of the somewhat unsurprising policy conclusions she reaches: that protecting our public drinking water "commons" makes more sense than drinking water bottled at distant plants.

Although judging by the cute title and cover art the topic might seem a bit frothy and more of a treatise on marketing and product development, the author's target is much wider. I am an environmental attorney and have handled permitting and litigation involving public water supply and sanitary treatment systems and bottled springwater, and am impressed by how the author is able to get so much technical detail right, while keep it readable and interesting to a lay audience. Ms. Royte has written one of the best general interest books in a long while on an important, probably, THE most important environmental topic (other than climate change/greenhouse gases) of "wat-san" and preserving/expanding our aging public water and sewer infrastructure. In getting to those conclusions by starting her inquiry with questions about commoditized bottled water, the author attempts to be evenhanded and fair in her depiction of the corporate and individual actors without overly indulging in anti-corporate bias.

My only minor quibble is the omission of any discussion of state licensing requirements and associated testing and reporting requirements (where it says, e.g., "NYSHD Cert. No. ___" on the label in small type). However, that's just a small omission, although I'm surprised the Nestle people didn't mention that there are state reviews of their in-house analytical and production data, it would seem to make their case stronger that water quality is not merely self-regulated or conforming only to advisory industry standards (i.e., IBWA) with respect to periodic testing, labeling and allowable maximum contaminant levels. That small error however does not detract significantly from the quality of this book. I've just ordered a few more copies of this book to share with several friends and colleagues who I think would be interested, that's how much I'm recommending it.

This is a remarkably interesting read that I am afraid hasn't gotten the attention it deserves. Ever since I read an article on "Fast Company" on the phenomenon of bottled water, I have been intrigued by it. A recent review in "Seed" introduced me to this book. I am glad that I read it.

Despite the "funny" review of a top 1000 reviewer (imagine that) that considers this book as propaganda for more regulation, it is quite the opposite. The book comes across as a systematic analysis of how the industry evolved and some on-the-scene reporting of key players like Nestle and Poland Springs. The chapter on the latter, neatly cataloging the unimaginable conflicts of interests and a apparently pliant local public officials, alone is worth the price of the book. It is impossible for a reader not to be shocked at some of the reporting (the author almost always avoids any preachy tone). The contrasts and comparisons drawn between the Freysburg and Kingsfield communities is an interesting read as well. There is another chapter that outlines some actions companies like Coke are taking to evaluate their footprint. Another chapter worth mentioning is "Something to Drink?" - the last chapter which takes a broader viewpoint and ties the topics to global warming and related issues. You will learn fun stats as "a cotton t-shirt is backed by 528.3 gallons of water and a single cup of coffee by 52.8 gallons".

Now, the negatives - The book takes a decidely US-centric narration. There is no extensive discussion on similar issues outside of the US (though there is some mention on the Coke debacle in India). The first-account narrative style helps to provide a very down-to-earth method to convey the ideas, but sometimes distracts from highlighting some of the salient points being made.

Nevertheless, an informative, entertaining read that will certainly question the utility of an entire industry.