Canberra uni to ban bottled water

[Slybacon]

Canberra uni to ban bottled water

Updated Fri Jan 21, 2011 7:18am AEDT

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2011/01/20/3117523.htm

The University of Canberra (UC) is introducing a total ban on the sale of bottled water on its campus.

It is believed to be the largest ban of its kind in Australia and the first across a university.

The ban was the idea of students and developed with input from the environmental action group Do Something.

Do Something founder John Dee says the ban will stop 143,000 plastic bottles from being sold annually.

Instead, students will have access to free water bubblers similar to the ones installed in the New South Wales town of Bundanoon, where water bottles have been banned since 2009.

"By supplying free water and cheap, chilled water, the university will be helping students to break a bottled water habit that's costing Australians half-a-billion dollars a year," Mr Dee said.

He says he hopes other institutions follow UC's lead.

"If the 13,000 students and staff at the University of Canberra can do this, there's no reason why every other university in Australia cannot do the same," he said.

"It will save students money. The water's better for their health and it will make a really big environmental difference."

UC vice-chancellor Stephen Parker says the ban makes environmental sense.

"The evidence is now really strong that bottled water does environmental damage," he said.

"The bottles themselves take about 200ml of oil to make, you can use up to 3 litres of natural water to produce 1 litre of bottled water and we also know that about 43 per cent of bottles are recycled so the rest ends up as rubbish or landfill."

Professor Parker says on-campus retailers agree to the change.

"Given that Canberra's got good and plentiful fresh water we just can't see the environmental argument to continue the sale of bottled water," he said.

"What we're also doing as part of this whole measure is introducing new bubbler machines and vending machines for different kinds of water sales, all of which will use refillable containers rather than the bottles that are currently sold.

"So actually we're hoping that consumption of water will go up on campus. It will be fresh and natural tap water. It won't be bottled water."

The ban is being phased in with sales of bottled water on the campus to end by March 22.

[bℓσωηG]

 

 

It will be fresh and natural tap water.

 

[gilligan]

Mmmmmm anyone for fluoride?

[psili sausage]

I agree the "fresh, natural tap water" comment is a little stupid, but really, this is a step in the right direction.

Does Canberra have fluoridated water? I wouldn't have thought the politicians would want that shit in their own water...

[13thdimensionconnection]

and vending machines for different kinds of water sales, all of which will use refillable containers rather than the bottles that are currently sold.

 

...

[bℓσωηG]

Does Canberra have fluoridated water? I wouldn't have thought the politicians would want that shit in their own water...

I doubt they drink tap water , unless the cameras are rollin, .... i read somewhere 98% of Australian towns and cities fluoridate drinking water

[botanika]

I agree the "fresh, natural tap water" comment is a little stupid, but really, this is a step in the right direction.

Does Canberra have fluoridated water? I wouldn't have thought the politicians would want that shit in their own water...

 

Yes Canberra's water is fluoridated but apart from that it's very good quality water, straight from semi alpine mountain dams. Canberra water is good. I'd rather have some fluoro in the water than a planet full of discarded plastic bottles thrown away by people with brown teeth ;)

[The Dude]

I'd rather bring in my own refillable drink containers with good clean water to university than blunt my intuition and pit my teeth. It seems that education is there to lobotomise free thinking and systematically, like a production line, create degrees that certify you are a well trained monkey that can repeat what their lecturers had said.

Higher learning is just another hoop to jump through to reshape your intellect into a mold that's fit for society (as the academia sees it). Interesting that higher education is universally the same and like minded, perhaps it is a mass hypnotism which self validates its own truths and not a real attainment of wisdom. (maybe all paradigms are this delusional)

Universally / You will never see.

I'm a fan of collective learning and consensus building and corroborating some kind of as-objective-as-possible view of reality, I just think the toxic meme of monetary control has infiltrated all otherwise benign institutions and their direction and integrity are now compromised, as is apparent by the move to fluoridate our youngest and brightest minds.

Edited January 24, 2011 by The Dude

[J Smith]

I don't know what the fuss is all about, I only drank beer at uni.

[psili sausage]

^^haha

[botanika]

Life's what you make of it.

I'd rather bring in my own refillable drink containers with good clean water to university than blunt my intuition and pit my teeth. It seems that education is there to lobotomise free thinking and systematically, like a production line, create degrees that certify you are a well trained monkey that can repeat what his lecturers had said.

It seems that higher learning is just another hoop to jump through to reshape your intellect into a mold that's fit for society (as the academia sees it) Interesting that higher education is universally the same and like minded, perhaps it is a mass hypnotism which self validates its own truths and not a real attainment of wisdom. (maybe all paradigms are this delusional)

Universally / You will never see.

I'm a fan of collective learning and consensus building and corroborating some kind of as-objective-as-possible view of reality. I just think the toxic meme of monetary control has infiltrated all otherwise benign institutions and their direction and integrity are now compromised, as is apparent by the move to fluoridate our youngest and brightest minds.

 

[kindness]

I think its a step in the right direction personally, I'm with Botanika on this one. Nothing wrong with buying a quality water bottle from a hiking shop and filling it yourself with filtered or rain water, or <gasp> tap water... Any of the tinfoil hat wearers here ever compare our access to clean water to other places around the globe? Perhaps have a look at some information about the situation in many African countries, the middle east, India etc - I can't remember the last time I heard about parents watching their children die of amoebic dysentery because of the water they have to use in Australia? hmmm

Or perhaps thinking about the garbage might be a persuasive argument? retrieved from http://geography.about.com/od/globalproblemsandissues/a/trashislands.htm (about the Great Pacific Garbage Patch).

The plastics in the patches consist of items like water bottles, cups, bottle caps, plastic bags, and fish netting. It’s not just these large plastic items that make up the trash islands though. In his studies, Moore found that the majority of the plastic in the world's oceans is made up of billions of pounds of raw plastic pellets called nurdles. These pellets are a byproduct of other plastics manufacturing.

Or perhaps this article from 2006 might be convincing? http://www.theage.com.au/news/national/bottled-water-the-new-ecodisaster/2006/02/25/1140670303250.html

I agree that fluoridation is probably not ideal, although I have only ever really heard and read the conspiracy type information on it, but our water infrastructure is completely adequate for sustaining human life. Drinking bottled water is surely a sign of our over consumption bourgeoisie ways.

[The Dude]

Bah! I'm over the "well, compare it to africa" type of arguments. Sure, other countries are getting beaten into submission while we're just hypnotised to submit. I don't know what's worse, a directly visible tyranny, or a hidden tyranny masquerading as freedom which everyone believes in.

Perhaps there wouldn't be such disparity between rich and poor if we weren't always on the consumer treadmill thanks to the hypnotic lure of tv, coupled with the effects of fluoride. It'd be better in the long term if we all died from water borne diseases then kept this bullshit system going with the aid of our "healthy" water induced state of mind.

The mental capacity of us privileged westerners means we're already dead. When the boot of tyranny isn't made all warm and fuzzy by the opiates of the masses, then we might just wake up to the fact we're getting kicked in the face.

[botanika]

Dude - the eternal optimist!

Bah! I'm over the "well, compare it to africa" type of arguments. Sure, other countries are getting beaten into submission while we're just hypnotised to submit. I don't know what's worse, a directly visible tyranny, or a hidden tyranny masquerading as freedom which everyone believes in.

Perhaps there wouldn't be such disparity between rich and poor if we weren't always on the consumer treadmill thanks to the hypnotic lure of tv, coupled with the effects of fluoride. It'd be better in the long term if we all died from water borne diseases then kept this bullshit system going with the aid of our "healthy" water induced state of mind.

The mental capacity of us privileged westerners means we're already dead. When the boot of tyranny isn't made all warm and fuzzy by the opiates of the masses, then we might just wake up to the fact we're getting kicked in the face.

 

[kindness]

I'd like to think that the solutions to humanities various problems lie outside of us all dying.

[mud]

Canberra has kickass delicious water anyway.

Anyone buying bottled water there is a fkn retard. Hmm..

heaps of em around. haha.

love

anyway,

who drinks flouride and is sick from it?

notice the gentic mutations or something? whats the bloody go?

i know its 'evil', but shit.

isnt everything?

[bℓσωηG]

its the accumalative effect,no one notices,makes no one care

[The Dude]

Could be a placebo effect, but I've found that after eliminating fluoride from my diet my mind doesn't seem so cloudy. Clarity of intuition.

The thing is, with being brainwashed or chemically lobotomised, you never know what you're missing out on, in terms of what you could know.

[psili sausage]

I think we're forgetting the main point of this thread...

[The Dude]

...what is the point of the thread? Is it not relevant to the discussion that institutions which are meant to advance knowledge are using water which limits the mind via calcifying the pineal gland? I mean yipee for limiting bottled water consumption but increased fluoride consumption may well be a side effect. I dunno, I suppose all education is an assembly line of drones to a greater or lesser extent.

[tripsis]

Excellent, they should ban water bottled in plastic nationwide, along with plastic bags at super markets.

I am constantly amazed at how many people on this forum adhere to the conspiracy bandwagon.

[synchromesh]

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=7319752042352089988#

[kindness]

Apparently Brisbane doesn't receive fluoridated water... Does that mean that people from Brisbane are smarter then given that they are less flouridized? retrieved: http://www.health.vic.gov.au/environment/downloads/wf_aust_and_vic_maps.pdf

anyone from Bello here and on town water? Seems you guys have just been switched on. retrieved: http://www.bellingen.nsw.gov.au/news/pages/14507.html

I figured that the whole of Australia's water supply, (when on mains/town water) was already fluoridated but it would seem this isn't so. retrieved: http://www.health.vic.gov.au/environment/downloads/fluoridation/fluor_aust_map2009_01_30.pdf Surely a study then of places with and without could pretty easily conclude whether its beneficial or not.

Seems from the little bit of reading I've done in the last hour or so that the same benefit i.e. 20 - 40% less cavities in the population can be gained from brushing your teeth with a fluoridated toothpaste, this still caused dental fluorosis though. retrieved: http://www.nhmrc.gov.au/_files_nhmrc/file/publications/synopses/Eh41_Flouridation_PART_A.pdf this report also goes into other stuff that some might find interesting.

here is another interesting site which allows you to see if you got fluoride by postcode in vic.

Edited February 8, 2011 by kindness

[ThunderIdeal]

brisbane never used to get fluoride, we do now.

[Slybacon]

I think we're forgetting the main point of this thread...

 

No I think most people here got the point.