Centennial ECO team: TAPH20

Melissa Grandberg, Emily Dickson, Cooper Reed, Dan Huard, Alex Andersson

Why We Chose Water Bottle Filling Stations?

Our environmental club members have been very passionate about environmental, humanitarian and health problems plastic water bottles were causing. We decided to find out approximately how many plastic water bottles where being consumed within our school. We went out and collected a weeks worth of plastic water bottles. The results were very disturbing, as we collected close to 400 water plastic water bottles. This is when we decided that our project this year was to find a solution to reduce our schools plastic water bottle consumption. After doing some research we decided that water bottle filling stations would be an efficient and easy way for students to use as an alternative to plastic water bottles.

What we choseWe contacted other Calgary

schools that had installed water bottle filling stations to hear their success stories. We found out that they installed Elkay water bottle filling stations and had a lot of success using them in their schools.

About Elkay• Stainless steel,

automatic sensor, cooler and filter

• Calculates the amount of plastic water bottles saved each by the school

Environmental Benefits of Reusable water bottles

Only one out of every six plastic water bottles are recycled, and the other five end up in landfills, incinerators or the ocean. This plastic will not decompose, but instead will break down into pieces small enough to be ingested by animals or leech into the water system. In the ocean, it is estimated that there is six times more plastic than plankton. These are just a hand full of the facts on plastic water bottles we found through our research. However, all of these devastating problems can be easily changed with a reusable water bottle. They are cheap, clean and can significantly reduce the amount of plastic water bottles being consumed.

Health benefits of Tap water Plastic water bottles cost about 2000 times more than

tap water. Not only is tap water less expensive, but we discovered that is cleaner too. Tap water is constantly regulated in Calgary with more than 110 000 water quality tests a year in 68 different locations. Unlike well regulated tap water, less than one FDA staff member is responsible for the regulation of plastic water bottles. Tap water is also free of harmful chemicals that are leached into water from plastic water bottles. These chemicals are very dangerous and some even cancer causing. Tap water is natural, clean and essentially free. We are so fortunate that we live in a place with such clean water, and should take advantage of it.

Carbon Offset CalculationWith the help of Roy Strum and the Calgary

board ECO team we were able to calculate the carbon offset of our water bottle filling stations. This not only help us with learning the impact our project will have, but will also help other schools who want to receive water bottle filling stations, because there will already be a carbon offset calculation. Using our calculation we found our carbon offset of the water bottle filling stations in our school to be 272 157.186 kg of CO2.

World Water Day Working with CAWST allowed us

to participate in their World Water Day. This day was one of our biggest accomplishments with our project, because it allowed us to educate and share with over 300 guests of the public and as well as other schools within Calgary. We also were able to talk to other schools and learn what they were doing in their schools and how we could incorporate their ideas into our school as well. We found out that a lot of Calgarians did not know about the regulation of tap water in Calgary and had originally believed that plastic water bottles were the healthier choice. It was a wonderful experience to be able to talk with the public and give them a whole new perspective on tap water. We were able to give them the education they needed to make their own changes in their lives to decrease their own environmental footprint.

Water Awareness Week We had a water awareness week at our school where we were able

to educated our school community on the damaging effects of plastic water bottles and how they can reduce their consumption. This week also allowed us to share our project with the school and get them excited to start using the water bottle filling stations. We even allowed the students to vote on where they thought would be good places to install them. Students were able to participate in lots of other activities during water week, including a taste test between tap water and plastic water, a question game and were able to pledge to reduce their plastic water bottle consumption by using the new water bottle filling stations. This week had a huge impact on both students and staff by allowing them to become included in not only the initial process, but the entire future of the filling stations. The grade 10 and 11 were especially impacted, because they will be the ones who will be able to enjoy them the longest and carry on their legacy.

Environmental CareersThe career aspect of our project was extremely helpful for all

the members of environmental club, because of our interest in pursuing an environmental career. This part of the project allowed us to explore the careers we were passionate about in greater depth as well as careers we may not have considered before. Each environmental club member researched at least one environmental career of their choice and presented what they found to the rest of the club. We had a whole range of careers presented, including teachers, soil quality testers, environmental consultants, ecologists, conservation officers and environmental engineers. There were so many ranges of job opportunities, from field work to conservation to education. All careers played an important role in protecting the environment.

Overall ImpactsWe hope that our water bottle filling stations will have an impact on each new generation to our school for years to come. Students will be able to continue on with our project by installing more stations in the school. Our water bottle filling stations will hopefully promote and encourage new sustainable projects to increase our schools sustainability.