Advertisement

Evian's answer to wasteful plastic bottles is a smart water dispenser

Renew's shrinking jugs use far less plastic than a typical water bottle.

Evian knows that plastic water bottles aren't terribly kind to the environment, and it has a clever solution to that problem: give drinkers a way to kick the bottle habit altogether. Its newly launched Renew water dispenser relies on unique 5L (1.3gal) "bubble" jugs that shrink as you use them, providing a hefty amount of mineral water without as much of an impact on the environment as usual. Each jug uses 66 percent less plastic than a 1.5L bottle, and they're both made of completely recycled plastic and themselves completely recyclable. You won't have to feel quite so guilty about wanting Evian for the gym or a long hike.

Not surprisingly, Evian wants to make it as easy as possible to order more water. The dispenser system keeps track of how much water you've used (you can check it through a mobile app), and you only have to push a Dash-style button on the unit to order more jugs.

Don't expect to buy a Renew right away. Just 200 people in London and Paris will get them as part of a pilot program debuting in May, with "wider" availability sometime in the future. It's a promising start, though, and this is part of a larger environmental plan that includes making all of Evian's plastic bottles from 100 percent recycled plastic by 2025. This isn't to say Evian is completely off the hook (clean tap water uses zero disposable plastic, after all), but this could go a long way toward minimizing Evian's impact on the planet.