Reducing Plastic Waste at IMSA

In Flint, Michigan, there is lead in the water supply because pipes were poorly maintained after they switched their water source from the Detroit River to the Flint River. Many people fell ill and had to resort to buying bottled water, and the widespread issue caused the demand of water to increase, but the supply wasn’t there. While this issue does not extend to IMSA, it does bring up the issue of water pollution around the globe, and we would like to do our part in solving it. Plastic in the oceans is a big problem, and much of this plastic comes from plastic water bottles. At Sodexo Grab-and-Go, many people take the small water bottles which they provide, and this leads to a large sum of plastic being thrown away every day here. To help counter this, we plan to work with Club Terra and Sodexo to create a fundraiser which would raise money to buy reusable water bottles for the students and promote their use. There are already many water fountains with water bottle refilling stations, so getting the water should not be a problem. However, since many of the water bottles only come from peoples’ breakfasts, we will work to put water bottle filling stations at the grab-and-go station.