We've all heard about the environmental problems due to plastic waste and the fossil fuels associated with the transportation of bottled water, but the April 14, 2008 issue of BusinessWeek details the impact that bottled water plants can have on the communities that contain them.
Given that the story (which is featured on the magazine cover) is titled "A Town Torn Apart by Nestle", you'd be correct if you assumed that the overall message isn't a particularly favorable one towards the maker of Arrowhead bottled water. One interesting tidbit details how Nestle paid for the lawyers who represented the town in negotiations with... Nestle.
Additionally, a distinction is draw between two types of bottled water that can be purchased... that which is from a municipal source and then refined (Aquafina as an example) and that which comes directly from a source in nature (Arrowhead and Fiji as examples). The message conveyed is that the environmental impact of water from a municipal source is less than the alternative.
