Boxed Water is Better high impact

Plastic water bottles are killing the planet. This company did something about it.

At U.S. Bank, we’re committed to positive change. The best way to honor our past and build a brighter future, is by standing up together today.

1.8 billion

The number of pieces of floating plastic that makes up the Great Garbage Patch, a giant floating island of plastic in the Pacific that’s three times the size of France and kills thousands of marine animals each year, according to Iberdrola.

Water conservation has never been as

critically essential to our survival as it is today. As of April, 48 percent of the U.S. and 57 percent of the lower 48 states were in a drought, according to Drought.gov. At least 37 states are experiencing some drought, with some regions worse off. The western United States, for example, is in the midst of an unprecedented dry spell, a megadrought not seen in 1,200 years. With drought mounting and the climate warming, many are asking what they can do to help conserve water, our most precious natural resource. Since we are not going to stop drinking water, one easy way to help the planet is to reduce the plastic waste in the ocean by stopping the use of single-use plastic bottles and aluminum cans.

If the US switched to Boxed Water cartons we could...

Reduce our carbon footprint

by the same amount as burning 2 million metric tons of coal.

Save enough energy

to power New York City for 1 month.

Drive across the country

Recycling for PET bottles is not working. In fact, less than 30 percent of bottles are recycled, which contributes to the Great Garbage Patch, a giant floating island of plastic in the Pacific that’s three times the size of France, with 1.8 billion pieces of floating plastic that kill thousands of marine animals each year. But did you know that it takes more water to make a single-use plastic water bottle than the bottle itself holds? With scandals mounting and public awareness of the wastefulness of its products growing, the single-use plastic water bottle industry is in full-on damage control mode. They’ve hired lobbyists, and these hired guns hide the facts and keep the single-use plastic bottle cash cow going. In 2019, the global plastic bottle industry was valued at $166.78 billion. These lobbyists also work for Big Soda, Big Oil, and Big Tobacco. The largest conglomerates are threatened by ending their profitable monopoly that has existed for 50 years. Big Plastic and Big Soda are trying to convince consumers that companies like Boxed Water Is Better are greenwashing with their products. The plucky paper-based water carton company offers a sustainable alternative to single-use plastic water bottles. But is Boxed Water really better? Ten years ago, this small team of environmentally conscious entrepreneurs had a big realization. Expecting the world to abandon single-use plastic bottles overnight was unrealistic. Consumers needed a pathway toward sustainability. From that, Boxed Water Is Better was born. As the first sustainable and reusable consumer bottle on the market, Boxed Water Is Better has been a target of Big Soda ever since.

from Los Angeles to New York City 2 million times.

Remember, single-use plastic water bottles are unequivocally wasteful. Never mind the fact that single-use bottles account for 31 percent of the world’s plastic waste, a disturbing figure even before you consider that plastic takes an estimated 700 years to break down, meaning that every plastic water bottle ever produced still exists, either floating in the ocean or buried in a landfill. The proliferation of plastic is so worryingly expansive in our ecosystem that scientists are now for the first time finding microplastics in the human body. Now, research shows that plastic recycling is actually declining as production increases. In 2020, over 2 million tons of post-consumer plastics sourced in the US were recovered for recycling, down 5.7 percent since 2019 according to the US Post-Consumer Recycling Data Report. It is true that to fully recycle Boxed Water Is Better cartons, the recycling facility needs specific machines to separate the layers. Not all recycling plants have this capability. Yet recycling for cartons exists. When you look at the disheartening fact that even though 74 percent of Americans have access to curbside plastic recycling, only 21 percent of single-use plastic water bottles are recycled, it’s at best disingenuous for Big Plastic to point the finger at Boxed Water Is Better. The single-use plastic bottle industry knows this, or they wouldn’t be trying so hard to smear their more sustainable competition. Even as the rate of plastic recycling continues to plummet, Big Plastic is trying to conflate the fact that because Boxed Water cartons are comparatively new, they have only 62 percent curbside access with recyclability. This is far from the truth. Once access is increased, this claim will become completely baseless. In fact, Boxed Water works with municipalities every day to increase access.

The best thing is to bring your own refillable bottle of water, but we know that’s not always possible... Boxed Water is the most sustainable water packaging we’ve found.

Diana Birket Rakow SVP, public affairs & sustainability, Alaska Airlines

Boxed Water Is Better considers Big Plastic’s attack as a sign that they’re on the right path. You know you’re doing something good for the planet if Big Plastic is targeting you. Despite bogus claims about the Boxed Water brand’s recyclability, the facts speak for themselves: Boxed Water™ cartons are actually eco-friendly and 100 percent recyclable. The entire packaging is 92 percent renewable materials, thanks to the fact that Boxed Water is made of paperboard carton and its plant-based cap is made from the tree pulp waste of sustainably harvested pines, a big leap over bottle caps from plastic bottles, which account for 15 percent of the 35.7 million tons of municipal solid waste Americans generate every year. Plus, this distinguishes Boxed Water’s packaging from other lookalike companies such as Tetrapak, whose packaging is only 72 percent renewable materials. Unlike Boxed Water’s tree-pulp cap, which is derived from paper industry waste, Tetrapak’s cap is derived from sugarcane and requires a great deal of natural resources to produce.

Big Plastic’s false claim that Boxed Water is difficult to recycle or not recyclable at all is partly concerned with this 92 percent renewable package and partly a misdirection on recycling as a whole. The cartons have very thin layers of plant-based plastic and aluminum to protect the water's freshness and quality. Big Plastic misleads consumers by making unsubstantiated claims since Boxed Water is made of these layers. While there is a small amount of aluminum in Boxed Water Is Better cartons, it is rolled and layered, requires fewer steps to produce, and makes half the environmental impact of an aluminum can. In fact, aluminum canned water has a 200 percent higher carbon footprint than Boxed Water cartons. Over 60 percent of cans are made from virgin aluminum, which means the raw materials are strip-mined and molded with a blast furnace, resulting in enormous natural habitat disasters.

Another contention of Big Plastic is that Boxed Water has misled the public about the company’s carbon footprint. This is patently false. An independent Life Cycle Assessment commissioned by Boxed Water proved Boxed Water superior to all other packaged waters, citing the company has a 36 percent lower carbon footprint than plastic bottles. Boxed Water Is Better – which has filling locations in Michigan and Utah – sources its water close to consumers, further reducing its carbon footprint. Compared to Big Plastic water brands, which often ship water from tropical, remote islands, this is a big difference: plastic has 18 times the environmental impact on ozone depletion compared to one Boxed Water Is Better carton. The water itself is every bit as pure as Big Plastic claims its products are. Boxed Water Is Better is purified from municipal sources, undergoing an eight-step process to provide pure water with no additives or dissolvable solids. The only difference is that Boxed Water offers consumers a packaging that is sustainable, recyclable, and reusable.

Its reusability was a key factor in Alaska Airlines’ decision to cut ties with Big Plastic and switch to Boxed Water on all flights, a move that will reduce in-flight waste by 1.8 million pounds. “The best thing is to bring your own refillable bottle of water,” says Diana Birket Rakow, SVP of public affairs and sustainability at the airline, “but we know that’s not always possible, and people need water in flight. Boxed Water is the most sustainable water packaging we’ve found.” Herein lies a huge advantage of paperboard packaging. Ultimately, we all need to be drinking filtered tap water from reusable containers. But when we can’t, Boxed Water Is Better offers consumers a segue between wasteful plastic and fully reusable containers. Their containers also remind consumers of the real harm the single-use plastic bottle is doing to our environment, especially now, when water conservation is so critical. Is the Boxed Water Is Better brand better than a reusable bottle filled from a clean water source? No, Boxed Water isn’t better. But it sure is an exponentially superior alternative to plastic bottled water and aluminum soda cans.

21%

Percent of single-use plastic water bottles that are actually recycled, despite that fact that 74 percent of Americans have access to curbside plastic recycling.

*Read Boxed Water's Independent Life-Cycle Assessment.