Choose Refill over landfill

Refill is a national charity supported locally by Severn Trent Water and Gloucester BID. Its initiative is being adopted in the city; the idea being to change the way people think about buying bottled water, and as a result reducing plastic pollution. Like in every city across the UK, plastic pollution has become an issue and charities such as Refill are coming up with ingenious ways to counter the problem.

Refill aspires to encourage people to reuse their empty water bottes. Businesses that have signed up to the scheme provide free water refills to those who would normally throw away their empty water bottles.

The charity has developed an app (Refill) so the user can locate the nearest participating business. These businesses have stickers on their windows promoting Refill’s charitable service inside. The stickers are to encourage people to visit the store knowing they will be greeted with a smile, even if their intentions is only to fill up a water bottle.

Cllr Richard Cook cabinet member for environment at Gloucester City Council said: “I believe it is everyone’s duty to recycle and reuse plastics wherever possible. I think Gloucester Refill provides our city with a fantastic opportunity to reduce the amount of plastic we throw away and to make us aware of what we can do to reduce the damage caused by throwing away reusable plastics.

Here in the UK, the average household uses 480 plastic bottles a year, but only recycles 270 of them meaning nearly half (44%) are not put in the recycling. This means that nationally, of the over 35 million plastic bottles being used every day in the UK, nearly 16 million plastic bottles aren’t being put out for recycling.

ENDS

Photographed L-R 3 members of staff of Museum of Gloucester (a Gloucester Refill Participant), Adam Watson (Severn Trent Water), Richard Graham (MP), Jess Fidler (Corporate Social Responsibility Lead - Severn Trent Water), Richard Cook (Cllr – Cabinet member for Environment).