Refill

Why Refill?

The goal of Refill campaign is to normalise refilling and make it as easy as possible for people to find free, high-quality, drinking water on the go. The aim is to create a national network of high street retailers, coffee shops, transport hubs and businesses offering to let the public to top-up their water bottles for free in every major city and town. Refill is being rolled out nationwide with full support of Welsh Government and water companies Dŵr Cymru and Hafren Dyfrdwy, Refill will substantially increase the availability of high-quality drinking water. It has never been easier to swap a single use plastic bottle for a free taste of the rolling Welsh mountains.

1. Prevent plastic pollution. According to the Environmental Audit Committee consumption of bottled water has doubled over the last 15 years, with over 7 billion plastic water bottles used each year in the UK. If everyone in the UK refilled just once a week, we’d prevent more than 340 million plastic bottles at source every year. Furthermore an appalling 700,000 plastic bottles are littered every single day in the UK. Many of these are making their way into our oceans. Plastic bottles now make up one-third of all plastic pollution in the sea and there are now over 159 plastic bottles for every mile of beach in the UK.

2. Save Money. Globally, the bottled water industry is expected to be worth $215.12 billion by 2025 and in the UK we are spending more than $2.4 billion a year on the stuff. That’s no surprise when you consider that we are buying around 3 bottles a week EACH every year. Refilling your reusable bottle is an easy way to save money, because bottled water costs between 500-1000 times more than water from the tap!

3. Help combat climate change. It’s been estimated that plastic production and the incineration of plastic waste give rise globally to approximately 400 million tonnes of CO2 a year with bottled water being 900 times more carbon intensive than drinking tap water. It takes over 8 litres of water to produce a single bottle, making it an incredibly inefficient use of resources, and that’s even before we’ve thought about flying it halfway across the world!

It is estimated that the Refill campaign will have saved over 100 million single-use bottles from entering our waste stream by the end of 2019.

What can you do? Download the free app to find out where the nearest refill point is or look out for the Refill window stickers. Pick up a refillable bottle and start refilling!

Are you a business? Why not sign up to become a Refill station. It’s quick and easy to do so, either head to the refill website: www.refill.org.uk