Proposal - Simple Benefits of Water

Lindsey Petersen

Proposal

English 102

Simple benefits of water

            According to the “Get America Fit Foundation”, “Obesity is the #2 cause of preventable death in the United States. 60 million Americans, 20 years and older are obese and 9 million children and teens ages 6-19 are overweight.  There is one simple and very inexpensive way to change these statistics and that is to drink just regular tap or well water.  I’d like to discuss tap drinking water in this paper.  I can go on forever on the benefits, but I have just chosen a few.

            Magnesium is a known mineral in tap water, but what many don’t know is that Magnesium is a great way to boost ones’ metabolism.   The national institute of health reports, “Tap water can be a source of magnesium, but the amount varies according to the water supply. Water that naturally contains more minerals is described as "hard". "Hard" water contains more magnesium than "soft" water.”  We aren’t going to get much in the way of minerals through “bottled water”

            Which brings me to my next topic is bottled water bad?  The Water Project reports that, “Every year over $100 Billion dollars is spent on bottled water world-wide.”  Bottled water is not regulated like normal tap city water.  Many studies have been done on bottled water and they all come back about the same.  Here is one I like best - Altogether, the analyses conducted by the University of Iowa Hygienic Laboratory of these 10 brands of bottled water revealed a wide range of pollutants, including not only disinfection byproducts, but also common urban wastewater pollutants like caffeine and pharmaceuticals (Tylenol); heavy metals and minerals including arsenic and radioactive isotopes; fertilizer residue (nitrate and ammonia); and a broad range of other, tentatively identified industrial chemicals used as solvents, plasticizers, viscosity decreasing agents, and propellants.”  We drink bottled water because we are led to believe that it is cleaner, but “the federal standards for tap water are higher than those for bottled water(Blomenfeld)”.  All studies done on bottled water have shown that most are nothing more than filtered tap water, so how are we getting the magnesium we need?

            There is another reason to drink tap water that we all know but decide to ignore and that is, what is it doing to our environment?  We all know that our landfills are being flooded with plastics so I will not touch on this, but how about other environmental factors.  Just supplying Americans with plastic water bottles for one year consumes more than 47 million gallons of oil, enough to take 100,000 cars off the road and 1 billion pounds of carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere, according to the Container Recycling Institute.”

            So next time you think you need to grab a case of bottled water at the grocery store, just know that you are doing it well informed.  Try to save the bottled water for occasions that you may need it, for example camping, or sporting events.

Blomenfeld, Jared, and Susan Leal. "The real cost of bottled water." Common Dreams. Org. San Francisco Chronicle , 18 Feb. 2007. Web. 22 Aug. 2011. <http://www.commondreams.org/views07/0218-05.htm>.

"Bottled Water - Making a Clear Choice." The Water Project. N.p., 2011. Web. 22 Aug. 2011. <http://thewaterproject.org/bottled_water.asp?gclid=CPq3rsWj46oCFRAE2godB3Az8A>.

Global Viewpoints. "Garbage and Recycling." Greenhaven Press. Global Viewpoints. Farmington Hills: Christine Nasso, 2011. 138-53. Print.

"Magnesium." National Institute of Health. N.p., 13 July 2009. Web. 22 Aug. 2011. <http://ods.od.nih.gov/factsheets/magnesium/>.

Naidenko, Olga. "Bottled Water Quality Investigation: 10 Major Brands, 38 pollutants." Environmental Working Group. N.p., Oct. 2008. Web. 22 Aug. 2011. <http://www.ewg.org/reports/BottledWater/Bottled-Water-Quality-Investigation>.

"Obesity Related Statistics in America." Get America Fit Foundation. National Institute of Diabetes & Digestive & Kid, 2007. Web. 22 Aug. 2011. <http://www.getamericafit.org/statistics-obesity-in-america.html>.

Royte, Elizabeth. Bottlemania. New York: Bloomsbury USA, 2008. 1-229. Print.