Sebastian Becerra

ENGL 2010

The End is Near… Unless We Make Changes Now to Save Our Planet

It’s the year 2500 and with a bag of clothes and your most cherished items on your side, you say goodbye

to your childhood home forever. When I think of the future, I imagine a dark, and grim earth, something from a

very dystopian novel or movie. If you’ve seen the movie Wall-E, that’s what comes to mind when I think of the

future. Garbage piling over the streets and piling over skyscrapers, leading to humans having to flee the earth

because we essentially destroyed our planet. That’s the future that we’re heading towards, and we need to do

everything in our power, now, to change our destiny. To help our environment, both at the local and worldwide

level, we need to act now to help reduce our impact by living a more sustainable lifestyle to save our planet.

A quick, easy, and effective way to help reduce our impact on our earth is by regularly using reusable

water bottles. As our global population continues to increase, so does our strain on the earth’s resources. At our

current growth rate, the human population is estimated to double approximately every 61 years (Rosenberg,

2020), it would be expected that our current demand on such resources should also double to support a doubling

population. Being the 3rd state with most national parks, we should be more mindful when making decisions that

affect our local environment and the beautiful state of Utah. In an unpublished survey-based study conducted by a

local student attending Salt Lake Community College (SLCC), it was found that the majority of Utahns are generally

environmentally conscientious, and actively make choices to reduce their impact on the environment. An

infographic by the Utah Department of Environmental Quality gives us 9 ways to ‘go green’ and one of them is to

use a reusable water bottle – but luckily for us, Utahns are way ahead of this. It’s no surprise that in the study

conducted by Becerra, 85% of participants regularly use reusable water bottles (Becerra, 2023). As far as the eye

can see, from classrooms to offices, from gyms to grocery stores, you’ll see people with reusable water bottles – a

simple, yet great method to help reduce waste and as found in a research study, individuals with reusable water

on average have increased water intakes compared to those who don’t regularly use reusable water bottles (Patel

et al., 2011). It’s worth mentioning that 4 out of 5 single use water bottles end up in the trash (Schriever, 2017),

which ultimately makes it to our local landfills. Unfortunately for these single use plastic water bottles, ending up

at our local landfills isn’t the end of the story. Single use plastics are a huge contributor to overflowing landfills
since they can take so long to deteriorate. The World Wildlife Fund (WWF) states that single-use plastics like water

bottles take roughly 450 years to decompose (WWF Australia, 2021). Using a reusable water bottle is only one of

many different ways to help reduce our impact on our environment.

On a larger scale, companies must also join the ‘green movement’ to help turn the tides against climate

change by being more responsible and reducing their carbon output and reducing waste. Large corporations like

Coca-Cola have taken swift action to do just that. Something as simple as rebranding the easily recognizable green

‘Sprite’ soda bottles to a new clear soda bottle has allowed their plastic bottles to be 100% recyclable now – the

green dye in their old bottles had an additive which isn’t able to be recycled (Valinsky, 2022). Our local news

network KSL recently interviewed Erica Hansen, the external communications manager for Swire Coca-Cola. When

asked about the recent change, Erica replied, “That shows the importance of sustainability for both the Coca-Cola

Company and Swire Coca-Cola that it’s time for us to be a leader.” She then added, “We want to encourage people

to recycle, and this is a way we’re trying to help lead the change” (Cabrero, 2022). A local Salt Lake City resident

stated in an unpublished survey by Becerra, when asked about any environmental concerns stated, “I know that

the sustainable choices I make are totally canceled out by corporations who pollute excessively. I still try though.”

(Becerra, 2023). When made aware of the recent change enacted by Coca-Cola, she said, “it’s still not enough,

there’s still room for improvement.” For other large companies, the time is now to follow in the steps of Coca-Cola

to reduce our impact on our local environments in the fight against climate change. Locally, our citizens do what

they can to reduce waste in Utah; in the same study, it was found that 84% of participants own and regularly use

‘eco-friendly products (Becerra, 2023). When another study participant was asked her thoughts on companies like

Coca-Cola taking action to become more environmentally friendly she responded, “you know, it makes me happy

to see large corporations doing stuff like this, it’s important for big names like Coke to take steps like this and set

the way for other big companies to follow; Even from a monetary standpoint this is a plus, as advertising that

they’re now 100% recyclable will appeal to that many more people, expanding their already HUGE demographic.”

Another method that we can take to help reduce our impact on the environment is using public

transportation to help reduce carbon dioxide output from excess vehicles on the road. On a recent article

published by local news network KSL about traffic congestion and the proposed highway expansion, the Journalist

Grant Frazier, talks about something called ‘induced demand.’ This phenomenon explains how increased demand
of a product increases it’s price or worth, but increased production lowers the same products worth; interestingly

enough it also applies to infrastructure, in the example of a new lane being added. Frazier says, “The result is that

more individuals opt to drive than before, and inevitably, the traffic becomes just as bad, if not worse, than it was

prior to expansion. Not to mention the fact that more drivers means more pollution…If we want to solve our traffic

woes, then we need to get serious about alternative methods of transportation” (Frazier, 2022). In the survey-

study performed by Becerra, it was found that only 31% of participants have taken public transportation within the

last 12 months, and only 15% within the past 6 months (Becerra, 2023). Maybe setting a goal of utilizing public

transportation or walking once per month would be a great way to kick start that health kick you’ve been pushing

off since the start of the new year. This is a big area of improvement that we as Salt Lake locals can work on to

improve our air quality, especially when we’re prone to inversions in the winter months.

As you can see there are a multitude of ways that we can help us help ourselves when it comes our home,

the earth. Something as easy as regularly using reusable items, or to taking public transportation more often, for

example. We need to reiterate the fact that there is a lot of work to be done by both corporations and you as an

individual, if we’re serious about saving our planet. It’s important to come together when it comes to taking care

of our planet, as we only have one. We must work together to help reduce our carbon footprint, and inevitably,

save the world.

 Works Cited
Cabrero, A. P.- A. 4. (2022, August 4). Sprite bottles at Utah's Swire Coca-Cola Going Green by
Ditching Green. KSL.com. Retrieved April 18, 2023, from
https://www.ksl.com/article/50452363/sprite-bottles-at-utahs-swire-coca-cola-going-green-
by-ditching-green

Bruchmann, K., Chue, S. M., Dillon, K., Lucas, J. K., Neumann, K., & Parque, C. (2021, September
28). Social comparison information influences intentions to reduce single-use plastic water
bottle consumption. Frontiers in psychology. Retrieved April 18, 2023, from
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8506027/

Laville, S., & Taylor, M. (2017, June 28). A million bottles a minute: World's plastic binge 'as
dangerous as climate change'. The Guardian. Retrieved April 18, 2023, from
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/jun/28/a-million-a-minute-worlds-plastic-
bottle-binge-as-dangerous-as-climate-change

Frazier, Grant. “Grant Frazier: Bigger Highways Don't Fix Traffic. Why Won't We Stop Building
Them?” The Salt Lake Tribune, 22 Dec. 2022,
https://www.sltrib.com/opinion/commentary/2022/12/22/grant-frazier-bigger-highways/.

Rosenberg, M. (2020, March 24). How to measure and understand population growth. ThoughtCo.
Retrieved April 18, 2023, from https://www.thoughtco.com/population-growth-rates-
1435469

Larsen, L. P.- F. 26. (2023, February 26). Utah regulators to deny permit for landfill on the shores of
Great Salt Lake. KSL.com. Retrieved April 18, 2023, from
https://www.ksl.com/article/50587183/utah-regulators-to-deny-permit-for-landfill-on-the-
shores-of-great-salt-lake

Patel, A. I., Bogart, L. M., Elliott, M. N., Lamb, S., Uyeda, K. E., Hawes-Dawson, J., Klein, D. J., &
Schuster, M. A. (2011, May). Increasing the availability and consumption of drinking water in
middle schools: A pilot study. Preventing chronic disease. Retrieved April 18, 2023, from
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3103565/

Schriever, N. (2017, December 7). Plastic water bottles causing flood of harm to our
environment. HuffPost. Retrieved April 18, 2023, from
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/post_b_3613577

WWF Australia. (2021, July 1). The lifecycle of plastics: WWF-australia: The Lifecycle of Plastics.
WWF Australia. Retrieved April 18, 2023, from https://www.wwf.org.au/blogs/the-lifecycle-
of-plastics/?rd=1
Valinsky, J. (2022, July 28). Sprite will no longer be sold in Green Bottles. KSL.com. Retrieved April
18, 2023, from https://www.ksl.com/article/50447462/sprite-will-no-longer-be-sold-in-green-
bottles

Becerra, S (2023) [Unpublished raw data on Environmental Sustainability in Utah] Salt Lake
Community College.
 Appendix A.
Survey-Based Questionnaire Study & Data Collected

1. Have you taken public transportation within the last month?

a. Yes: 0%
b. No: 100%
2. Have you taken public transportation within the last 3 months?
a. Yes: 8%
b. No: 92%
3. Have you taken public transportation within the last 6 months?
a. Yes: 15%
b. No: 85%
4. Have you taken public transportation within the last 12 months?
a. Yes: 31%
b. No: 69%
5. Do your showers run longer than 10 minutes?
a. Yes: 54%
b. No: 46%
6. Do you carpool to work/school?
a. Yes: 85%
b. No: 15%
7. Do you use reusable water bottles?
a. Yes: 85%
b. No: 15%
8. Do you recycle?
a. Yes: 77%
b. No: 23%
9. Do you think that you, as an individual can directly impact (either negatively or positively)
our environment?
a. Yes: 77%
b. No: 23%
10. Do you purchase or use an ‘eco-friendly’ products? (e.g. reusable straws, products made
from recycled materials, reusable bags, reusable totes, etc.)
a. Yes: 85%
b. No: 15%
11. Do you have any environmental concerns?
a. Yes: 70%
b. No: 30%