Restaurants Stop Selling Bottled Water

About half a dozen Boston-area restaurants will sign a pledge to stop selling bottled water.

Environmental advocates, through the Think Outside the Bottle Campaign say four billion pounds of plastic water bottles end up in U.S. landfills each year. They also say meeting Americans' demands for bottled water required more than 17 million barrels of oil to manufacture bottles and transport the water. In addition, about 40 percent of bottled water actually comes from a municipal source.

Among the restaurants doing away with bottled water is the Other Side Cafe on Newbury Street, whose owner, Henry Patterson, says after years of tasting different types of water for use brewing coffee, Boston tap water is among the best he's had.

"Boston water is great," he says. "There's no reason in the world not to drink Boston tap water."

Other restaurants taking the pledge today are the Grasshopper in Allston and Herrells ice cream.

City officials say many restaurants have already 'gone green' and stopped selling bottled water as part of an overall environmental plan.

Think Outside the Bottle organizers say they want Boston to follow cities like San Francisco that have cancelled municipal water contracts.

Boston Chief of Environmental and Energy Services Jim Hunt says Boston's older infrastructure makes that too difficult right now, but the city is promoting tap water.

However, the International Bottled Water Association says the industry is being unfairly targeted, since water bottles only make up a third of one percent of garbage in the U.S.