Americans consumed 13.7 billion gallons of bottled water in 2017 - more than any other beverage by volume - boosting an industry worth $18.5 billion. 67.3% of bottled water sold in the United States is in single-serve plastic bottles. 70% of those plastic water bottles are not recycled.
Globally, about 20,000 plastic bottles are bought every second, the majority of which contain drinking water.

Proponents of the ban on bottled water say that it would reduce waste and protect the environment by preventing the manufacture, purchase, use, and discarding of up to 68 billion plastic water bottles a year. They also say that banning bottled water is good for our health because of reduced exposure to potentially contaminated sources of water and to the toxic chemicals emitted from the bottles themselves and the plastic bottle manufacturing plants. A ban would save consumers and local governments money, and protect local communities from the threat of depleted or contaminated municipal tap water supplies.

Opponents of the ban on bottled water say that it would remove a healthy beverage choice for consumers, leading to increased consumption of unhealthy sugary drinks. They also say that the ban is misguided as a waste-saving measure as other beverages are sold in containers that are more harmful than plastic water bottles. A ban would remove a practical option for water storage and dissemination during times when municipal tap water supplies are contaminated, as well as removing a beverage choice that the majority of American consumers want, negatively harming small business profits.

Pros

• Banning bottled water would reduce waste and protect the environment
• Banning bottled water would save money, and public water fountains are convenient and plentiful
• Banning bottled water would protect local water supplies

Cons:

• Banning bottled water restricts consumers' access to a product they want, and negatively affects small businesses
• Other types of beverages have plastic containers that are more harmful than plastic water bottles, and bans don't necessarily reduce waste
• Banning bottled water removes a healthy choice and leads to increased consumption of unhealthy sugary drinks

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Source used
https://www.procon.org/headline.php?headlineID=005401

Bottled water tastes like 1000x better than the tap water where I live, I see why they'd do it but NO

Bottled water tastes like 1000x better than the tap water where I live, I see why they'd do it but NO

Right?! I hate the smell and the taste of chlorine from tap water.

I can drink a bottle of water easy, but should I try to down a glass of water from the tap, it makes me feel sick.

My mother thinks I'm crazy and that there's "no difference".

Laughs while drinking clean water directly from the tap.

Buy a filter for your tap water, STOP KILLING THE DOLPHINS   

Seriously though, if you really think tap water tastes different, buy a filter for it and stick it in the fridge, its fine you won't die.

I can understand the con of "if bottled water is banned it might encourage people to pick sugary drunks more" - to counter this, id say stop selling bottled water in BULK i.e packs of 6 or big 2l bottles. Just have a selection  of the 500/1l bottles in the fridge for people to pick with their meal deal or whatever.

Biodegradable packaging as an alternative. Education on recycling or much stricter policies put in place. We are such a materialistic society purely ran on capitalism, it's sad.

If bottled water is banned than all other food packaging will have to be reviewed obviously, as alot of this isn't recycled either. I think biodegradable options is the only way forward unless we grow our own food and collect our water from the river.

Most things humans do now have a negative impact in some way or another.

 

We occasionally buy bottled water if we're out of the house for long periods, and I don't let the kids drink sodas or sugary drinks...so if we run out of what we bring with us...we'll buy water.  I don't think bans are ever the answer to just about anything; however, education and incentives to make better choices may be an answer.  For example, we buy milk directly from a farmer.  If we bring the bottles back to him, we get a discount on our next purchase.  So, guess what...we always save our bottles and take them back to him.  To do this with plastic water bottles would obviously need to be on a greater scale than my single farmer, but it could be a step closer to going in the right direction.

More emphasis should be put on recycling centers to actually take plastics and suitably recycle them. Its all very well saying "we must do more to recycle" but when your local council only recycles a small variety of plastic, tin and paper, and a few counties away they recycle 90% more types, it puts a mockery on the whole system.

As for banning bottles, I totally agree that bottled water tastes so much better than tap or even filtered water. I tend to buy mine by 5l at a time though so I'm not using so many individual bottles, or if I do I make sure theyre reused or recycled.

The idea is a great one, but I'm skeptical of things like public fountains. Yes, it would be awesome to just fill up a bottle in the street from an underground pump, but how quickly will it be vandalised? In my city? Probably will survive 2 hours.

Hopefully a solution will present itself soon!!

~Mudds

We all need to look at the products that we buy and how to recycle, plastic straws are one of my pet hates right now

I wouldn't really care if bottled water was banned here, because our tap water doesn't taste bad regardless of where in the country you are. But my sister who lives in UK tells me the tap water there has a distinct taste and it's not pleasant, so unless that's fixed, banning bottled water probably isn't a good idea. They would probably have to ban all the soda bottles to make a dent.

Recycling could be made mandatory to really make a difference. The majority of households already do it here. All garbage should be sorted by glass, metal, plastic, paper (packages vs newspapers), electronics, food, combustible, hazardous, and then whatever is left for landfill.  Make proper stations for garbage sorting in every neighbourhood and make it a part of culture to be environmental friendly.

In Sweden you get money for every bottle you recycle.

I'd prefer stricter rules on recycling. Make more recycling bins available in towns and parks etc. Clamp down on companies who don't actively make an effort to recycle.

I personally don't think the government should be able to tell us what containers we can use to drink water with.

Maybe they could create major incentives to companies/people who recycle.

I think that there shouldn't be a ban. However a limit to the number of bottles allowed to be produced per month until the ratio of recyclable to non-recyclable is improved.

The world would be such a nicer place if people weren't just dicks. Recycle ffs. Ain't hard.