Yahoo Finance Millions pay $180 a year for something we all get free
Despite having high-quality drinking water by world standards, more than a million Aussie households mostly drink bottled water at home.
This is costing these people a collective $3.4 million each day and contributing to Australia’s concerning single-use plastic waste problem.
In the event these bottled-water-only households stopped this habit, that would stop 6.5 million single-use plastic bottles from being discarded in Australia.
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The bulk of Aussies admitted to spending at least a few dollars a month on bottled water, according to an IPSOS study commissioned by Brita.
Most people - 31 per cent - managed to keep a lid on their bottled-water habit, spending between $1 and $5 on single-use plastic bottled water each month.
Around 18 per cent admitted to spending between $6 and $15 a month, while 10 per cent spent somewhere between $16 and $25 a month.
On the higher end of the spectrum, 4 per cent of people spent between $26 and $35, 2 per cent spent between $36 and $45 a month and another 2 per cent spent more than $46 a month on bottled water.
These purchases can mount up. Spending $15 a month on bottled water adds up to $180 a year.
Some Aussies did manage to keep hydrated without splashing out on bottled H2O, with around 34 per cent of those surveyed spending no money on bottled water.
Why we buy water when it's basically free from the tap
Most Aussies - around 26 per cent - said they only resorted to single-use bottled water when they had forgotten their reusable drink bottle.
Half of those surveyed said this happened around once a month.
While the majority were worried about Australia’s plastic waste problem and wanted to do the right thing by the environment and their wallets, a quarter said convenience outweighed their attempts to be sustainable.
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