Call for airport to ban plastic water bottles
County legislators ask Albany to follow lead of San Francisco on issue
The Albany County Legislature wants Albany International Airport to ban the sale of single use plastic water bottles.
Twenty two of 39 county lawmakers on Monday night agreed to a proclamation calling for the move, according to legislator Doug Bullock.
“The San Francisco Airport recently successfully phased out all sales of water sold in plastic bottles saving consumers money, reducing waste, cutting single use plastic and encouraging the more healthy use of tap water,” Bullock noted in an email.
In San Francisco the ban took effect in August and applies to restaurants, stores and vending machines.
Travelers there must bring their own bottles if they want water, which can be obtained at airport fountains. Flavored or sparkling water is excluded from the ban. The West Coast airport was actually conforming to a 2014 ban in San Francisco, which owns and operates it.
The Albany facility, however, is operated by its own board of directors and is not a part of city government. The airport is actually in the town of Colonie.
Bullock said the legislature was finalizing the request, which hadn’t yet been sent to the Albany airport.
Judith Enck, a former EPA regional administrator who now teaches a course on plastic waste at Bennington College, said Albany might be the second airport to do so, if the ban were to take effect.
“It is terrific that the Albany County Legislature supported this proclamation on single use water bottle pollution. Bottled water is expensive for consumers and creates huge amounts of plastic, that often is not
recycled,” Enck said in an email.
The request comes as more and more institutions are looking at reducing their use of plastic, which is not biodegradable and adds to the planet’s growing waste stream.
The University at Albany as well as the Bethlehem school district recently banned plastic straws. Consumers instead can use alternatives like paper straws or folding steel straws.