Many scientists, health advocates and environmentalists believe single-use plastic water bottles may threaten human health and wellbeing. Read white paper here.

There are times of the year where we humans overindulge over days or weeks for reasons ranging from the religious to celebrating a new year, the arrival of spring, or a major historical event. In the US, the holiday season kicks off with Thanksgiving toward the end of November and continues through Christmas and the New Year. Often healthy choices, hydration and nutrition go to the wayside. Read white paper here.

Yoga is more popular than at any time during its long history, with over 200 million practitioners. And the predictions are that yoga will continue to grow in popularity in line with modern-day holistic trends in many parts of the world towards healthier and more mindful lifestyles. Read white paper here.

Over 60 million women, men, and children on six continents play golf regularly. But although played for hundreds of years, the latest sports science says modern golf is taking a toll on players with more powerful swings sparking traumatic injuries. Read white paper here.

For hydrating before or rehydrating after yoga, consider adding chia seeds to your water. Chia means “strength” in the Mayan language. Aztec warriors relied on them for energy and stamina. A good protein-carb combo, these wonder seeds absorb water and, once eaten, stay in your system longer than drinking a glass of water on an empty stomach or with a meal. Plus they’re a great way to introduce loads of heart-healthy omega 3 fatty acids into your diet. Just soak a quarter cup (40 grams) chia seeds in in four cups of water (1 liter) for about 20 minutes. For a little flavor, add a slice or squeeze of your favorite fruit and a dash of salt. This little wonder food in your water helps you workout harder and your body recover faster. Drink slowly and enjoy.

Bluewater calls time on single-use plastic water bottles

Bluewater joined with golf’s foremost organisation, the R&A, to make golfing history at The 148thOpen Championship at Royal Portrush, Northern Ireland, in July 2019, by blazing a new victory in the global campaign to halt the ecologically damaging impact of single-use plastic bottles on the planet.

The R&A, organisers of The Open Championship, leveraged Bluewater’s position as a global innovator in drinking water technologies and solutions to provide 19 unique water stations and unique reusable stainless steel bottles to enable hundreds of thousands of visitors, players, staff and officials to enjoy on-demand fresh water without needing a throwaway bottle.

Some 5,000 special edition BPA-free refillable stainless steel Bluewater water bottles were given to fans free of charge during the week of The Open – and the bottles were also on sale throughout the venue, selling in the tens of thousands. Additionally, all golfers competing in The Open were given a personalised Players’ Edition stainless steel Bluewater water bottle with their name laser-engraved on it.

Interested in getting your own bottle? Sign-up here.

Bluewater founder and CEO calls for throwaway plastic bottle crack-down

Bluewater founder and CEO Bengt Rittri has called for an immediate global crackdown on single-use plastic bottles.

"Microplastics pollution caused in part by dumping of throwaway plastic bottles imperils the health of the planet and humanity," said Mr. Rittri, a Swedish environmental entrepreneur. He noted how over one million single-use plastic bottles are produced every minute, with over 70 percent ending up as trash in landfill and oceans.

Mr. Ritrri’s call came on the back of a WHO study saying microplastics have been found in almost every planetary source of water on the planet, from rivers and lakes, the ocean, wastewater, and drinking water. You can join Bengt Rittri’s movement to halt the use of single-use plastics here.

Read more here.

World Water Week Stockholm

Global water issues of access and pollution were spotlighted together with sustainable solutions during World Water Week at an exclusive Bluewater business luncheon attended by over 150 movers and shakers in the Swedish business community. Arranged and co-hosted by Bluewater and Nordea, the leading banking institution in the Nordic marketplace, attendees heard from some of the world’s foremost water experts about the need for urgent action to protect scarce water supplies amid predictions that by 2030 demand for water will exceed availability by 40 percent.Keynote speakers including Jennifer Sara, Global Director for the World Bank Group's Water Global Practice, Will Sarni, an internationally recognised thought-leader on water strategy and innovation, Dr. Lisa Svenson, UN Environment Director for Ocean, and Mina Guli, a water advocate and ultra-runner recognised as a global leader fighting to avert the world water crises. Read more here.

Winners announced during World Water Week in Stockholm

The 2019 Imagine H2O Urban Water Prize, founded by Bluewater and by 11th Hour Racing, was awarded to three prize winners from India, Colombia and the USA at an awards ceremony at the start of World Water Week in Stockholm, the Swedish capital, at the end of August. The 2019 Challenge attracted 226 startups from 38 countries.

The winning entries were WaterTower Robotics (USA); Indra (India); and Zilper Trenchless (Colombia). Additionally, the Challenge honored three startups as finalists – each of which received deployment award funding. Finalists include: SmarterHomes (India), StormSensor (USA) and Upepo (Kenya). The winning startups will use Imagine H2O Urban Water Challenge funding to deploy solutions in cities in three continents.

Read more here.

Americans exposed to contaminated drinking water

American media reports that millions of Americans may be exposed to contaminated drinking water systems that are dangerous for their health. An interactive map, a collaborative effort by Environmental Working Group, a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization, and Northeastern University's Social Science Environmental Health Research Institute, documents toxic fluorinated compounds known as PFAS at publicly known pollution sites across the U.S., including public water systems, military bases, military and civilian airports, industrial plants, dumps and firefighter training sites. The researchers found at least 610 drinking water sources in 43 states contain potentially unsafe PFAS levels, and estimate that more than 19 million people are exposed to these man-made chemicals that have been linked to birth defects, increased risk of thyroid disease, infertility and reduced immune responses in children, writes U.S. News.

INDIA

India is reeling under historic drought. Acute water shortages across much of India have seen hundreds of villages evacuated with up to 90% of local populations fleeing in some water scarce areas. Long term human and economic threats loom large as crops have withered and died, leaving livestock starving and with little to drink while major crops, such as maize, soya, cotton, sweet lime, pulses and groundnuts have suffered.

Australia

Sydney is facing its first water restrictions in a decade as drought grips New South Wales with falling water levels in city dams, prompting the state government to bring in water restrictions.

United Kingdom

Plastic accounts for 60% of litter in English and Welsh canals with more than half a million plastic items reach oceans from waterway network each year, according to new research from the Canal & River Trust – a charity that looks after 2,000 miles of canals and river navigations.

Keeping up our efforts to return the planet to health again

Bluewater celebrates Earth Day on April 20. Why? Because we as a company and team of individuals are on a mission to help end throwaway plastic pollution of our oceans and lands. And return our planet to health.

Since April 22, 1970, Earth Day has been mobilizing tens of millions of people in just about every country around the world to create a new environmental paradigm. Many of us at Bluewater share the annual Earth Day outpouring of energy, enthusiasm and commitment – and do our best to do all we can as individuals to turn words into action and become catalysts for change.

See the anti-plastic pledges our team members are making to celebrate Earth Day 2019 here.

Plus, please do your bit for the planet by helping us to reduce, refuse, reuse, recycle and remove single-use plastic bottles by joining Bluewater founder Bengt Rittri´s (photo right) Global Clean Drinking Water Movement.

“In nature, nothing exists alone.” — Rachel Carson, 1962

Reality bites

• USD 2.5 trillion = the annual cost of plastic pollution
• 8 million tonnes = the amount of plastic entering our oceans every year
• 1 million = the number of plastic bottles purchased every minute
• 2 billion = the number of "green" actions carried out by Earth Day Network, including planting hundreds of millions of trees in areas needing reforestation in 32 countries

A hyper-competitive competition by top business publication Fast Companyto identify world-changing ideas saw Bluewater recognized with honorable mentions in two categories – Consumer Products and Developing World Technology.

The Bluewater Global Clean Drinking Water Movementand the Bluewater Mobile Water Trailerwon the recognition of Fast Company editors, writers and outside judges as ideas creative and powerful enough to rank in the list of 2019 World Changing Ideas Awards chosen from thousands of entries!

Inspiration as a force for good

“All of us at Bluewater think it’s brilliant to see both Bluewater’s global clean drinking water movement and ground-breaking mobile hydration station trailer recognized as a Fast Company World Changing Idea,” said Bluewater founder and CEO, Bengt Rittri, a Swedish environmental entrepreneur.

Honoring products, concepts, companies, policies, and designs that are driving innovation for the good of society and the planet, the awards recognize everything from large companies’ sustainability initiatives to clever consumer products to ground-breaking government policies. ‘There are many problems in the world, and we are interested in innovative ideas that solve any of them,’ says Fast Company.

The clean water movement

The Bluewater clean water initiativeseeks to build a planet-wide movement aimed at bringing cleaner, healthier water to everyone and create oceans and lakes without plastic. The goal is to activate human ingenuity to bring pure drinking water to everyone, everywhere and disrupt the global beverage’s industry reliance on single-use plastic bottles.

The game-changing trailer

Developed and launched in 2018 by the folks in Bluewater’s South Africa team, the game-changing Bluewater Trailerpurifies and dispenses up to 2,000 liters daily of purified drinking water, served still, sparking and chilled, and accessed from most water sources, including wells and lakes. Generating potable water on site, the 3-meter long trailer slashes the need for single-use plastic bottles at sporting, music and other events, serving water from multiple dispensers, as well as helping remote work sites in the mining and other industries.

About FAST COMPANY

• The world’s leading business media brand
• Focus on technology, leadership, world-changing ideas, creativity, and design.
• Over 700,000 each month
• 17.2 million views monthly of its website
• Inspires readers to ‘think expansively, lead with purpose, embrace change and shape the future go business’.

For more information, click here.

Bluewater has launched a ’smarter’ generation of its powerhouse top-of-the-range Bluewater PRO water purifiers. Offering enhanced user benefits, the upgrades will start with serial number 1845-01001 and will incorporate updates designed to deliver enhanced installation and user benefits. All Bluewater PRO 400 and 600 water purifiers have been given new modernized electronics and software aimed at further improving the installation and user experience. The electronic board is divided for design and technical reasons into two (2) separate boards, where the main board is now located inside the purifier unit and the diodes board is located behind the panel. Speak to your local Bluewater organisation for more details. Contact information.

We’ve taken a quick look back at 2018 and thought we’d share some facts and figures from what was a 12-month long season of action for the Bluewater Brand in line with our ‘clean water for everyone’ mission. And, providing a solid platform for our onwards march to provide the world’s best premium water purification solutions for homes, business and public dispensing, alternatives to single-use plastic, and raising awareness on the critical water issues of our time! ● 2018 saw Bluewater launch ingenious water purification public hydration stations able to generate pure drinking water onsite even from water considered unfit for human consumption. ● These hydration stations were deployed both to key water crisis areas across the world, notably in Flint, Michigan and Cape Town, South Africa. ● Bluewater’s public hydration stations sustainably provided an estimated 27 million gallons of clean water, preventing the equivalent of over 800,000 standard-size plastic bottles from entering landfills and oceans. ● Bluewater distributed clean water in six continents, Africa, Asia, Europe, North America, Oceania, and South America, in countries ranging from Australia, Brazil and China to Britain, The Netherlands, South Africa, Sweden, and the United States. ● Bluewater made strategic investments in four water companies also on a mission to provide consumers access to clean water while battling single-use plastic bottles: I-Drop Water in South Africa, TAPP in Spain and US-based Microlyze (now Spout) and FloWater (watch a recent TV interview with Flowater’s CEO here). ● The Bluewater clean drinking water movement forged impactful partnerships to further its global impact. Key partners include the United Nations, Volvo Ocean Race, Friends of the Chicago River, 11th Hour Racing, and Imagine H20. In partnership with Imagine H20, three water technology startup companies--Microlyze (Denver, CO), Drinkwell (Dhaka, Bangladesh) and SmartTerra (Bengaluru, India), received a sum of $1 million to spur green innovation and continue the clean drinking water movement. ● Our company branding activities attracted massive online publicity encompassing almost 170 pieces of coverage with a total ‘readership’ of 1.7 billion… and we saw over 29 thousand social shares of our information.

Bluewater’s second national survey of Americans’ drinking water attitudes and habits shows almost a third of Americans (28%) have experienced water contamination issues in the past two years, a slight increase from a prior poll.* The Google Consumer survey carried out in January 2019 attracted 2000 responses. It reveals how the deteriorating state of America’s aging infrastructure is affecting Americans as Federal government rollbacks on clean water protections threaten to compound national water problems. The Bluewater survey also reveals more Americans are taking action to improve their water supply quality. Nearly 60 percent of respondents reported they are taking some kind of action to control what’s in their drinking water--ranging from drinking store-bought bottled water to using a purification system or water delivery service. The survey also hinted at how Americans are embracing clean solutions. Approximately one in five Americans reported they now routinely carry reusable water canteens and hold a desire for public water refill stations, helping the environment and ensuring access to uncontaminated water. Additional Survey Findings: - 24 percent of respondents are concerned lead and toxic metals are in their drinking water. - 11 percent of respondents are concerned PFAS contaminate their drinking water. - 9 percent of respondents rely on bottled water because their water supply is compromised. Click here for more information.

Film Afrika, one of South Africa’s leading television and film production and servicing companies, is pioneering the move towards environmental sustainability by using unique mobile water purification trailers from Bluewater on the set of Raised By Wolves, TNT’s highly anticipated serialized sci-fi series from master storyteller and filmmaker Ridley Scott (The Martian, Blade Runner, Alien: Covenant), which marks his television directorial debut. The Raised by Wolves series is currently in production in the Western Cape. The Bluewater Trailers are keeping the 400-strong crew hydrated during the peak of the South African summer and since December have already eliminated the use of almost 50 000 single-use plastic water bottles on set. Throughout the duration of the production, it’s estimated that the Bluewater Trailers could reduce single-use plastic waste by up to 581 818 bottles, while significantly lowering the drinking water cost to the production company. Click here for more information.

It was Florida sunshine all the way as Bluewater scored a huge success at its first appearance at the 2019 NAFEM (North American Association of Food Equipment Manufacturers) in Orlando, Florida, in the second week of February. With exciting products from over 600 of the world’s leading equipment and supplies manufacturers showcasing their products, the Bluewater booth was visited by over 160 potential customers, 90% of them are decision makers for food equipment supplying companies. “This is an extremely successful trade for us and verifies that our strategy to focus on food service industry is correct,” said North American sales chief Lin Guo. “The Bluewater Pro 400 was a winner and makes a perfect fit for food service industry. with all visitors impressed by the compact size and high capacity.” Noting that the Bluewater booth won many compliments for its stylish, yet simple Nordic design ethos, she said opportunities were being discussed with sales rep firms from Virginia, Massachusetts, New Mexico, California and contact was made with a Canadian dealer with national capabilities across Canada. “We had a good discussion with a cruise line food service buying group who provide food equipment supplies and service to five major cruise lines and showed interest in our hydration station concept and, interestingly, we also met with a team from Facebook who needs a solution to provide clean water in 15 break rooms for 6000 employees in one building.” Click here for more information.

Microplastics are in table salt, the food we eat, the tap and bottled water we drink, in beer and now are being found in our poop, which means the tiny particles less than 5 millimeters in size have invaded our bodies, posing a threat to the hormones that help steer human reproduction, metabolism and growth. That’s the bad news. The good news is that Bluewater’s water purifiers remove microplastics (and over 97% of all other known water contaminants) from tap water. Discover more.

In South Africa, Bluewater partnered with local bottle maker Consol to provide an alternative to single-use plastic bottles at the highly popular KAMERS/Makers crafted creativity show. Click here for more information.

The powerful Bluewater Pro 600 water purifier was showcased to China’s leading retailers and affluent Chinese homeowners at the China International Import Expo November 5 – 10 in Shanghai, China. The show saw over 3,000 exhibiting companies from 130 countries unveil their latest products, but the PRO 600 stood out thanks to its ability to deliver unmatched levels of contaminant-free water with a powerful flow direct from a residential shower or kitchen tap.

In bustling Shanghai, Bluewater has opened its first major instore retail pod in a leading premium luxury department store. Bluewater Pro and Spirit are showcased in ‘real life’ environments, including a shower. For more information, click here.

Bluewater describes new study from Denmark’s Aarhus University showing nitrate in drinking water can bring an increased risk of colon and rectal cancer even at levels below current drinking water standards as alarming. Click here for more information.

Bluewater has opened its official office in Hong Kong, which will market the company’s products and services throughout South East Asia, Australia and New Zealand. The opening was celebrated in grand style with ‘lucky’ lions as a centre piece.

The 3.2 million readers of the Norwegian Airlines Inflight Mag in November were able to read about Bluewater's efforts to deliver pure drinking water to everyone in a sustainable way. An article in the inflight ’N’ magazine reflected Bluewater's belief that business will do good by being good for planet and humans.

Read article.

Bluewater describes as ‘alarming’ new findings by scientists at Aarhus University that link nitrates in drinking water to an increased risk of colon and rectal cancer. The study, published in the International Journal of Cancer, followed 2.7 million Danes between 1978 to 2011 and was based on an analysis of over 200,000 drinking water samples taken mostly from private drinking wells.

It’s awesome news as it reflects how Bluewater has put sustainability at the very heart of our business geared to provide access to clean water to everyone everywhere and halt the need for single-use plastic bottles. Now in their 12th year, the edie awards are the UK’s largest and most prestigious sustainability awards, recognising excellence across the spectrum of green business; from the best efficiency programmes through to product innovations, from stakeholder engagement and social sustainability initiatives to the people on the ground who are making change happen. We strive to be change-makers at Bluewater by harnessing human ingenuity to deliver innovative technology and solutions to return our blue planet to health for all living on it. Check out the 2019 shortlist here.

European lawmakers are seeking to extend the list of single-use plastics they want to ban. Light plastic bags, products containing oxo-degradable plastics and expanded polystyrene fast food packaging have been added to the list of plastic cotton buds, forks, knives, spoons, sticks, plates, straws, drink stirrers and sticks for balloons that MEP’s on the Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety (ENVI) want barred, according to an article in the Journal de l’environnement.

The world's first ocean cleaning system from Boyan Slat's Ocean Cleanup Foundation has started work on the "Great Pacific Garbage Patch”, which is located between San Francisco and Hawaii and ranks the largest of Earth’s five ocean trash piles. The system comprises a U-shaped pipe with a 3-meter deep net underneath designed to trap floating plastic. Every few months a boat will arrive to collect the trapped waste for recycling on shore. Read more about the ocean cleanup system here.

Yachting hero Dee Caffari has signed a sporting partnership with Bluewater, a water purifying company that sees itself as a life company focused on harnessing human ingenuity to make good things happen as the leading innovator for drinking water solutions. As the company's Global Brand Ambassador, Dee will work closely with Bluewater to further raise awareness around the ocean plastic pollution issue, how that is linked to drinking water quality and how Bluewater’s existing solutions help solve both these major problems. Read more about the partnership with Dee Caffari here.

London’s Harrow Half Marathon became the British capital’s first to offer no single-use plastic bottles to runners. Instead, runners were able to rehydrate themselves with Ooho – water in a biodegradable sachet made from 100% seaweed-based membrane. Runners collected them from volunteers when passing water stations. The material is edible and can be treated just like food.

Bluewater has announced a strategic investment for a minority stake in TAPP, a European tap water filtration company. Bluewater said the investment is designed to help TAPP accelerate its vision to provide sustainable faucet-based filtration solutions for clean and affordable tap water. Founded in 2015 as a research project in Barcelona, TAPP Water produced its first pilot tap water filter in 2017, which proved a huge success with over 10,000 units being sold within the first 12 months. In July 2018, TAPP, which has business centers in both London and Barcelona, launched its second product that provides a simple, affordable and environmentally friendly way for every household to get clean tasty tap water without needing to resort to buying bottled water. Read more about the investment here.

The European Parliament has overwhelmingly backed calls to adopt a ban by 2020 on microplastics that are added to cosmetics, personal care products, detergents and cleaning products. MEPs voted in mid-September by 597 votes to 15 in favour of the Parliament's Environment Committee (Envi) recommendation that the European Commission adopt a ban. The Commission is also proposing a ban on certain single-use plastics, such as cutlery, plates and balloon sticks, and recommending that goods packaging companies contribute towards the cost of cleaning up discarded plastics.

Helsinki Fashion Week and Sweden’s world-leading drinking water tech and solutions company Bluewater partnered in July to put an off-catwalk spotlight on the global circular economy, sustainability values and drinking water pollution in an age of growing water scarcity. The fashion industry is a major contributor to water pollution issues as cotton farming, manufacturing, dyeing of garments and washing of polyester impact freshwater resources. To help inspire positive change through awareness and creativity, Bluewater installed one of its unique hydration stations in the Helsinki Fashion Week EcoVillage and pumped water from the Baltic Sea using a Bluewater Pro water purifier to directly generate clean, safe drinking water. Read more about Bluewater and Helsinki Fashion Week here.

Volvo Ocean Race sustainability programme received award honours at the prestigious international 'Beyond Sport Awards', in New York in mid-September. Bluewater was hugely proud to have been a main partner for the programme, which won in ‘The Best Corporate Campaign or Initiative in Sport for Good’ category. The programme - aligned to the UN Sustainable Development Goals - saw the Race work in partnership with 11th Hour Racing, the Mirpuri Foundation, UN Environment’s #CleanSeas campaign as well partners like Volvo and Bluewater. “The Volvo Ocean Race helped us to showcase in real-life at each Race stopover how Bluewater is turning words into action to deliver sustainable drinking water to people and businesses in heavily populated urban environments," said Anders Jacobson, President and chief strategy officer at Bluewater.

What are the best health-protecting water purification systems?

A new white paper from Bluewater looks at the water challenges posed by issues ranging from a mounting list of pollutants to water shortages or flooding sparked by climate change, all compounded by degrading water delivery pipe networks and sewage systems. Sadly, few water facilities are purposely equipped to fully remove the likes of hormones, toxic metals, synthetic organic chemicals and other pollutants such as micro-plastic particles that have been polluting our planet in ever increasing amounts due to industrial, construction and agricultural activities?

Bluewater has landed in South Africa. In early September, the company used the official opening of its African head office in Cape Town to unveil a world-first in water purification technologies in partnership with local social enterprise I-Drop Water. A mobile solution that transports purified non-municipal water to remote locations, the Bluewater Mobile is a compact and durable unit that can be placed in just about any location to offer up to 2000L of pure, chilled drinking water (still and sparkling) dispensed at a rate of up to five litres per minute. Building upon I-Drop’s existing footprint in several countries in Southern Africa and utilising I-Drop’s award-winning remote water monitoring and control ‘IoT’ technology, Bluewater intends to expand its presence across the continent with a range of water purification solutions. Bluewater will first offer its top-of-the-range Bluewater Pro in the South African market, where there is heightened awareness of water as a precious resource. Read more about Bluewater in South Africa in this press release.

Bluewater has invested $500,000 in Microlyze, a US company that has developed a real-time water testing device to empower American utilities with accurate, reliable and cost-effective measurement of water quality collected directly from households. The Bluewater investment will help Denver-based Microlyze accelerate the roll-out of its Waterlyzer, a device that easily attaches to a smartphone, analyzes tap water and identifies contaminants of concern in real-time.

“The Waterlyzer is a complete game changer, allowing consumers to discover what they are drinking and enabling communities to uncover potential threats,” said Anders Jacobson, Bluewater President and Chief Strategy Officer.

Read more about the investment here.

Three winning companies, Drinkwell (Dhaka, Bangladesh), Microlyze (Denver, CO) and SmartTerra (Bengaluru, India) were winners of the Urban Drinking Water Challenge, a global innovation competition to deploy and scale decentralized drinking water solutions for fast-growing, water-scarce cities. The Founding Partners were Bluewater and 11th Hour Racing. Over 160 startups from 37 countries registered for the Challenge. They represent a diverse range of technologies and entrepreneurial approaches to solve urban water scarcity and advance U.N. Sustainable Development Goal 6. Bluewater and 11th Hour Racing committed up to $1,000,000 in cash prizes, pilot funding awards and investment. Each winner was showcased in Stockholm during World Water Week that ran August 26 - 31, 2018.