Dear Editor:

According to the Container Recycling Institute (CRI), 60 million plastic water bottles are thrown away every day. Of these bottles, 80% will end up in a landfill according to treehugger.com or littered around the outdoors, and what little is left will be melted and made into different plastic products.

Clearly, it would be beneficial to NHS and the environment, if we installed more water filling stations around the school building.

ELKAY is a company that wants to offer safe drinking water to students. ELKAY’s water filling stations filter the water while saving waste because they are designed to fill water bottles easier than drinking fountains. By making it easier to fill bottles, students can bring in reusable bottles instead of plastic ones.

There are already have a few of these water filling stations in the Mercury Commons, lunchroom and the Conant building at NHS. Previously, the ECO club was able to raise enough money by selling scented pencils to install the stations, according to an article published in last year’s school newspaper.

If NHS was able to raise the money again to add even one more station, it would make a positive impact on school as well as the environment.

ELKAY also has water stations that are available for outdoors in parks and community areas. To view more options, please see www.elkay.com/bottle-filling-stations. With all the community members coming into NHS for concerts, plays, sports games etc., people can see the stations and look into getting some for the community.

Sincerely,

Emily Smock, senior