Free water plan to cut out plastics

A project to make free drinking water available on every high street in Britain could save a billion plastic bottles by 2025.

To encourage people to reject single-use plastic, the Refill campaign by City to Sea and Water UK aims to ensure people can replenish their water bottles in every major town and city by 2021. A Refill app will show where people looking for the nearest free water outlet can go.

The campaign can already help users find free tap water on the go at more than 12,000 places in the UK, with John Lewis and Morrisons the latest to sign up as water providers.

In the UK, 7.7billion plastic water bottles are used each year, with the average Briton using 150 plastic water bottles annually. If just one in 10 people refilled even once a week, it would stop the dumping of 340million plastic bottles a year.

Samantha Herbert