Protecting Our Planet

Limiting Plastic Waste

Nearly 1,500 single-use plastic water bottles are consumed every second in the United States. Only 10 percent are successfully recycled. The result is millions of discarded plastic bottles crowding landfills and floating in our oceans – bottles that take more than 450 years to break down!

The data is daunting, but there are a few small things you can do to limit your environmental impact, and Louisville Water is here to help!

  • First and foremost, avoid purchasing single-use bottled water whenever possible. Louisville Pure Tap™ has won multiple national taste-test awards, beating out other water utilities AND bottled water brands. Our scientists and engineers work hard to deliver our great-tasting water straight to your faucet. We make it easy for our customers to drink sustainably without having to sacrifice quality or taste.
  • Second, bring a reusable bottle with you when you leave the house to hydrate on the go. There are several locations to fill up around Louisville – you can even bring an empty reusable bottle through security at the Muhammad Ali International Airport to fill up with Pure Tap before you hit the skies. Need a reusable bottle of your own? Louisville Water customers can get two complimentary bottles per year. Get yours today!
  • Link to Bottle Request form.

And don’t forget to encourage your friends, family, and colleagues to make Pure Tap their beverage of choice. Every time someone in Louisville chooses to drink Pure Tap, fresh from the faucet, a plastic bottle is saved from going to the landfill. Together we can make our city and planet a better place for future generations.

An Economical Choice

Did you know that bottled water is the top selling beverage in the United States? That’s right: American’s spend more on pre-packaged water than any other beverage! Yet bottled water is nearly 2,000 times more expensive than tap water. A person drinking 80 ounces of water per day will spend around $2,190 a year on bottled water, while the same amount of Pure Tap would cost only $0.82.

When you drink local and choose Louisville Pure Tap, you’re not only helping the environment, you’re putting money back in your pocket – all without sacrificing quality or taste!

Infrastructure Sustainability

Sustainability is about more than just limiting waste and pollution. It’s also about taking proactive measures to leave things better than you found them. At Louisville Water, that mission drives many of our practices, including our ongoing commitment to infrastructure revitalization.

Louisville Water’s Main Replacement and Rehabilitation Program (MRRP) was started in the 1980s as an effort to proactively and strategically upgrade aging water main infrastructure. MRRP remains a key focus of our strategic plan. The program now uses advanced technology to identify potential leaks and weaknesses in the more than 4,200 miles of pipes throughout our service area – all without shutting off the flow. This ongoing effort helps to minimize water lost through leaks and main breaks while also ensuring customers always have access to Louisville Pure Tap.

Other recent initiatives have also helped Louisville Water to ‘go green.’ Implementation of digital systems such as KloudGin and Work & Asset Management (WAM) have replaced 30-year-old procedures that were mostly paper driven.

In addition to going paperless, these systems allow Louisville Water crews to work more efficiently and to be more localized, helping to limit vehicle emissions and improve overall operations. According to Director of Infrastructure Planning and Records James Bates, “Our mission with this project was doing the right thing in the right place at the right time.”

Louisville Water is a recipient of the Sustainable Water Utility Management Award – an honor recognizing water utilities that have made a commitment to management that achieves a balance of innovative and successful efforts in areas of economic, social, and environmental endeavors. With an ongoing focus on innovation and education, Louisville Water aims to build on these sustainability initiatives in the years to come.