Starbucks Wasting Millions Of Gallons Of Water

[dgridley]

STARBUCKS was blasted by environmental experts last night after Britain's Sun newspaper accused it of pouring millions of litres of precious water down the drain at its coffee shops.

The giant coffee chain allegedly has a policy of keeping a tap running non-stop at all its 10,000 outlets worldwide, wasting millions of litres a day.

That would provide enough daily water for the entire two million-strong population of drought-hit Namibia or fill an Olympic pool every 83 minutes.

Every Starbucks branch has a cold tap behind the counter providing water for a sink, called a dipper well, used for washing spoons and utensils.

Bizarre health and safety rules are said to ban staff from turning the water off, as bosses say that a constant flow stops germs breeding in the taps.

http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,24456537-663,00.html

Thumbs down, Starbucks!

 

[Epic]

That's better than using dirty utensils every time in my opinion.

 

[Sabre]

That's better than using dirty utensils every time in my opinion.

Agreed. :tu:

 

[dgridley]

When people worldwide are suffering from drought, I'd take the "dirty" utensils.. they can turn the water on when they need it. They don't need to leave it on all the time. I've worked at dozens of restaurants and have never encountered such waste or foolishness. If they're worried about germs, they can use a filtering system.

 

[GILSAN]

Starbucks are probably the only ones in the world to do this. What a wastefull and pathetic policy. :td:

 

[barefoottech]

Running Water has never prevented Bacteria from multiplying.
More mindless Crap from SpinDoctors.

 

[dgridley]

Running water from a contaminated source will only spread the contamination AFAIK. And hopefully, they're not using contaminated water or pipes in the first place.

 

[GILSAN]

We don't have and don't need Starbucks here in Madeira. We have excellent coffee here and a whole lot cheaper.

I say boycott Starbucks.

 

[Phoebe_]

hmm They will have the top spot in Guinness for being the biggest coffee company that wasted Millions Of Gallons Of Water.

 

[Dulin_Time]

I don't like Starbucks at all... but honestly here in the US one can't really "waste" water. If Starbucks were to turn off the water when they didn't need it, that would not at all help the people suffering from drought or lack of clean water. Either way, there's no impact on the rest of the world who needs more and/or clean water.

I'm not condoning wastefullness, it just wouldn't make a difference either way.

 

[Humdizzy]

I used to work at Starbucks. This running tap was used to keep the stirring and pouring spoons from having disgusting caked up milk on them. They would keep the spoons clean all the time so we would have a clean spoon when we went to make a new drink. If the wells didn't have running water going through them, all of the milk would sit in there and spoil, thus people would get sick from milk just sitting around all day in a container.

One could say we could just rinse them off as we needed, but the rush of people make this solution the most efficient solution. Besides the amount of water being left on is not that much. It's a small stream of water being let in to displace the current liquid in the well so it can drain out and be kept filled with clean water.

 

[dgridley]

OR they could wash tem as use them as needed.

I used to work at Starbucks. This running tap was used to keep the stirring and pouring spoons from having disgusting caked up milk on them when we went to make a new drink. If the wells didn't have running water going through them, all of the milk would sit in there and spoil.

 

[GILSAN]

I don't like Starbucks at all... but honestly here in the US one can't really "waste" water. If Starbucks were to turn off the water when they didn't need it, that would not at all help the people suffering from drought or lack of clean water. Either way, there's no impact on the rest of the world who needs more and/or clean water.

I'm not condoning wastefullness, it just wouldn't make a difference either way.

It may make a diference in certain parts of the world where Starbucks do business. They have over 15,000 stores in close to 50 countries. That's a lot of water down the drain. :td:

 

[dezinerite]

Who cares? EVERYONE wastes water.

As long as Starbucks is paying for their own water bill, I don't see the problem.

 

[dgridley]

:lol: You don't think our water useage here affects the world supply? We may have alot of water but we also have alot of water treatment issues, etc. We need to conserve water here just as much as elsewhere.

Believe it or not, pure, fresh water is in short supply everywhere (ever heard of brush fires, for example, in California and elsewhere because of the dry season?)

I don't like Starbucks at all... but honestly here in the US one can't really "waste" water. If Starbucks were to turn off the water when they didn't need it, that would not at all help the people suffering from drought or lack of clean water. Either way, there's no impact on the rest of the world who needs more and/or clean water.

I'm not condoning wastefullness, it just wouldn't make a difference either way.

 

[Humdizzy]

OR they could wash tem as use them as needed.

I just updated my post, but yea when I worked there, they had that issue with items that could not be washed automatically. Human error and laziness among workers caused some things to go unwashed, which then would need to be completely sanitized before use again.

In terms of the spoons. They are used way too often to be cleaned after every use. Ultimately more water would be used because we would turn on a faucet full blast just to clean one spoon every 10 seconds while the tap we have set aside only lets out a tiny amount.

 

[namebug]

This is nothing compared to what is needed to grow the coffee in a commercial manner

 

[dWhite]

Someone care to explain how this is wasting water? All drainage goes back into the ocean and the ocean filters it out and recycles it.

I don't see anything being wasted here.

 

[Humdizzy]

Someone care to explain how this is wasting water? All drainage goes back into the ocean and the ocean filters it out and recycles it.

I don't see anything being wasted here.

Lots of energy goes into treating our water.

 

[.X.]

Someone care to explain how this is wasting water? All drainage goes back into the ocean and the ocean filters it out and recycles it.

I don't see anything being wasted here.

Ok, I now am defiantly concerned, I need to the watch the news one a month, or read more news on the net.

The toilet water goes into the ocean, then filters it, and then we drink it again, not to mention the thought of eating Crab or salt water fish.

The next time my brother - in - law, calls me a shit head, I will just say Werd