University of California, Berkeley
This campaign made possible with support from TGIF

I Heart Tap Water is a collaborative campaign between Cal Dining, Recreational Sports, Environment, Health & Safety (EH&S) and University Health Services to promote the drinking of tap water as the preferred beverage of choice.

Why?
Your Campus | Your Health | Your Planet | Your Money | Your Action

Prize Drawing Winners

Your Campus

  • In 2006, the Berkley campus alone sold 89,851 cases of bottled drinks, translating to 2,156,424 individual plastic bottles. Water sales made up 39% of those sales.
  • In a 2006 survey of over 800 Cal students, 70% said they rarely drink from campus tap water sources. They identified the need for more sources of drinking water and more convenient locations to refill non-disposable water bottles. They also said we need to improve the perception of water safety and perception of cleanliness of water fountains.

Here is some information about campus water:

  • Safety
    Tap water at UC Berkeley is sourced from the Sierra Nevada snowmelt and then further filtered by our water district (EBMUD) before it reaches campus water fountains. As such, the water UC Berkeley receives from the tap is very high quality.

  • Campus water fountains - Great News!
    Last Fall, students in the Community Nutrition class completed an assessment of over 450 water fountains in most campus buildings, looking at fountain functionality, visual appeal and water pressure and color and odor of the water. Only 21 fountains were rated unacceptable and are currently being evaluated for repair or replacement. Over 220 of the fountains received an excellent rating and 203 received acceptable.

    Fountains on campus are cleaned daily by our campus facilities staff. Given that fountains may or may not be used on a daily basis, it is desirable to run the water for a few seconds prior to drinking from them.

    If you should encounter a water fountain that is in need of attention, please send an email to Patrick Kaulback, the campus Sanitarian, at pkaulback@berkeley.edu. Thank you for helping!

Hydration Stations Now at Rec Sports
The first two Hydration Stations - high tech water bottle refill units - are now installed at Recreational Sports. See Quench Your Thirst the Berkeley Way (Berkeleyan article, 3/19/09)

Our longer term vision includes ideas such as signage on buildings identified as having Hydration Stations, as well as campus maps with Hydration Station icons.

 

Your Health

  • Liquid calories now make up 21% of our total calories, a significant increase from 25 years ago and a contributing factor in weight gain and the obesity epidemic. We need to select more calorie-free beverages, aka water!
  • Sugar consumption has increased by 28% since 1983, fueling soaring obesity rates and other health problems. Most of that sugar is attributed to the consumption of soft drinks.
  • Health experts are recommending we limit ourselves to about 10 teaspoons of added sugars per day. One 12-ounce can of regular soda has 10 teaspoons of sugar; energy drinks can range from 7 to 17 teaspoons; and a medium size mocha coffee has 8 teaspoons.

Source: Sugar in drinks

 

Your Planet

  • The 30-plus billion plastic water bottles purchased by Americans in 2006 required the equivalent of more than 17 million barrels of oil - enough to fuel more than one million vehicles for a year and produce more than 2.5 million tons of carbon dioxide.
  • Campus Recycling estimates less than half of the plastic bottles purchased on campus are recycled.

 

Your Money

  • In 2006, Americans consumed 8.3 billion gallons of bottled water- that's 26 gallons per person! And, the cost of all this bottled water is high-- economically and environmentally. Americans spend $0.89 to $8.26 per gallon on bottled water, while tap water costs an average of $0.02 per gallon.
  • Here's another way to put it -- Bottled water, which can cost as much per gallon as gasonline, is a thousand times more expensive than tap water.

Source: Pacific Institute's Fact Sheet [PDF]

 

Your Action

Take the Pledge, be a part of the vision. If you have a favorite campus refill locations, please share it. If you need to purchase bottled water, please be sure to recycle the bottle.