A new petition is asking for graphic text and photos to be slapped on the single-use containers.
Labels warning people about the dangers of lung cancer, heart disease, and emphysema are common on cigarette packaging around the developed world. But if thirsty consumerslooking to sip from a plastic bottle of water were confronted with stickers and photos that educated them about the containers’ disastrous effects on the environment, would they change their purchasing habits?
That’s the hope of Santa Cruz, California, resident Trey Highton. Last week he launched aChange.org petition asking the Golden State to “continue its role at the vanguard of the conservation movement by placing graphic warning labels, similar to those now on cigarette packaging, on single-use plastic water bottles.”
Highton notes that thanks to California’s catastrophic four-year-long drought, petitions asking for corporations such as Walmart and Nestlé to be prevented from bottling the state’s precious H2O supply have garnered plenty of public support. Earlier this year it was discovered that despite operating on an expired permit, Nestlé sucked 750 million gallons of water out of California’s San Bernardino National Forest in 2014. Meanwhile, Walmart’s Great Value brand taps Sacramento’s municipal water supply.
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