The Facts: Fifty billion bottles of water are consumed each year in the United States, about 137 million bottles every day.  About one quarter of these bottles are recycled (through an extremely energy intensive process).  Each day, Americans throw out 103 million plastic water bottles.

Some claim bottled water is safer or tastes better than tap water.  Consider this: both Aquafina (PepsiCo) and Dasani (Coca-Cola Company) originate from municipal water systems.   In blind taste-tests, most people can’t tell the difference between bottled water and tap water.  And, plastic bottles often leach chemicals into the water they hold.

Here is a trailer for “Tapped” a documentary about the bottled water industry:

Why should Christians care about bottled water?

Using a refillable container instead of buying bottled water is an easy way to live out Christ’s message of mercy.  When we use a refillable container, we don’t consume the energy for producing and transporting a disposable plastic bottle.  We also don’t consume the energy to recycle or dispose of the plastic bottle.  While this may seem like a small measure, the cumulative effects make a difference.  You can stop the production of 50 billion plastic bottles by using one refillable bottle.

In about 1970, the U.S. reached peak oil.  Before peak oil, we extracted MORE domestic oil each year than we had the previous year.  After 1970, we extracted LESS domestic oil each year than we had the previous year.  As the graph below shows, to meet our shortfall in domestic production, we have relied on oil imports (rather than decreasing demand).

Sometime this century, we will reach global peak oil—each year after that, the world will extract less oil than it did the previous year.  Unless demand drops with supply, there will be extremely high prices and severe oil shortages.  Transportation, agriculture, the manufacture of goods, even the production and delivery of medicine will all be drastically effected.

Why should Christians care?

When there are limited supplies of necessary resources, people have a predictable reaction: war.   The winners of conflict will have oil; the losers will go without.  If we do nothing to reduce demand before supply begins running out, a generation will be thrown into a world of war and poverty.  Will this be the legacy we leave future generations?

The transition away from a petroleum-based economy will happen by the end of this century.  The question is whether we Christians take action to make this a peaceful transition to renewable resources; or, will we ignore the suffering we will cause future generations by continuing our complete dependence on oil.

What got me thinking about peak oil today is this Honda commercial/documentary.  Interestingly, the commercial casually mentions the end of oil as a known fact.  It’s surprising we don’t hear more about this in the national energy conversation.

Enjoy.