Starbucks to stop bottling Ethos Water in California

Starbucks has announced it will stop producing the bottled water brand Ethos Water in California due to the drought and will instead move the bottling operation to Pennsylvania.

The change by the Seattle-based coffee chain comes as some Californians have voiced concerns about the potential impacts of bottled water plants on local water supplies during the drought.

Ethos Water is bottled at a Safeway-Lucerne Foods bottling plant in Merced. The water comes from private springs in the town of Baxter, in the Sierra foothills.

A portion of the sales of Ethos Water go toward charitable projects in water-stressed countries. For each bottle purchased, Starbucks says 5 cents goes to a fund that has supports water and sanitation programs in coffee-growing countries such as Tanzania, Indonesia and Colombia. For Starbucks, that focus on aid for water projects may have seemed increasingly at odds with drawing water from springs in a region coping with extreme drought.

Starbucks said in a statement Thursday that it is moving the bottling operation "due to the serious drought conditions and necessary water conservation efforts."

John Kelly, Starbucks' senior vice president of Global Responsibility and Public Policy, said the company wants to "support the people of the state of California as they face this unprecedented drought."

Kelly said the decision to move the operation to the company's Pennsylvania supplier is one of multiple steps being taken "in partnership with state and local governments to accelerate water conservation."

Starbucks said it will start shifting production to Pennsylvania starting this week and over the next six months, "while simultaneously exploring alternatives to transition to a new source and supplier to serve the company's West Coast distribution."

The announcement prompted praise from Adam Scow, California director of the advocacy group Food & Water Watch, which has taken a critical stance against the bottled water industry, and in particular against bottling in drought-stricken areas.

"I think Starbucks values its image as a responsible corporation with respect to the environment," Scow said. "It's a good move for their image."

Scow said, however, that he doesn't expect other larger bottlers to follow the example of Starbucks.

A total of 108 licensed bottled water plants are operating in California, according to the state Department of Public Health. The department regulates the plants and collects information on water quality and the sources tapped. But no state agency is tracking exactly how much water is used by all of those bottling plants, or monitoring the effects on streams and local water supplies.

Scow's group has begun calling for the State Water Resources Control Board to step up its oversight.

"The water board really needs to get on top of managing aquifers in the state as a public resource," Scow said in a telephone interview. "There should be a moratorium on bottling for private profit in the midst of this drought."

The state appears unlikely to single out the industry in such a way, though. As state officials have adopted emergency drought regulations mandating cuts in urban water use, they have given cities and local water districts leeway to determine how much of those reductions should be borne by their commercial and industrial customers as well as by domestic customers.

Companies pumping groundwater from their own wells generally haven't faced restrictions thus far, and companies that hold rights to water from springs have been able to keep using it for bottling.

Felicia Marcus, chair of the State Water Resources Control Board, said bottled water companies are treated just like other categories of water users.

"The same rules apply to them that apply to anyone using water: You've got to have a right to it, or you've got to buy it from someone who's got a right to it," Marcus told The Desert Sun in a recent interview. "If you have a right to the water, we've treaded gingerly on that and focused on outdoor irrigation, ornamental landscaping, but we don't pick and choose water uses as between industrial and commercial uses yet. It's like telling farmers what to plant with the water they have. We don't do that either."

Statewide, the bottled water industry accounts for a small fraction of overall water use. The U.S. Geological Survey has estimated that roughly 1 percent of the water used in the state goes to industrial users, with bottling plants being a small portion of that.

Scow and other critics have said that while the amounts of water are relatively small in the big picture, the extraction of water can have significant impacts on local supplies of groundwater that people use and on watersheds that provide habitat for wildlife.

"If these facilities are pumping at high rates, and continue to pump at high rates, especially in a drought, you have a risk of depletion of groundwater," Scow said. "And there's a relationship between the streams and the groundwater."

Another group, Courage Campaign, launched an online petition in March demanding that Nestle stop bottling water in California during the drought. The group says more than 160,000 people have added their names to the petition, which is directed to the state water board.

Nestle Waters North America, the largest producer of bottled water in the country, runs five bottling plants in California – in Sacramento, Livermore, Los Angeles and Ontario, as well as in Cabazon on the reservation of the Morongo Band of Mission Indians.

Jane Lazgin, a spokeswoman for Nestle Waters, said the company has an emphasis on "being responsible water stewards" and closely monitors its sources of spring water.

"There are a number of springs in California so we can diversify and not over-rely on any one spring," Lazgin said. She pointed out that bottled water requires much less water to produce than soda or other beverages, and said Nestle focuses on operating its plants as efficiently as possible.

She said the company recognizes a need for "strong policy" on water, particularly during the drought.

"Oversight and measurement and information and transparency, this is how good decisions will be made," Lazgin said.

"No one knows exactly what the future's going to bring. But it is providing a product that people want and doing it in a way that is mindful of the environment," Lazgin added. "And being part of these dialogues and discussions and decisions that are being made, of course we would adhere to whatever statutes or mandates might have to be implemented in the future. No one knows. But I think that there's a place for bottled water."

Nestle draws some of its water from Arrowhead Springs, located in Strawberry Canyon in the San Bernardino National Forest. The permits for the company's water pipelines and wells list 1988 as the year of expiration, and it's one of a backlog of hundreds of water-related permits that the Forest Service has allowed to fall out-of-date in California.

Forest Service officials have said they are making the renewal of Nestle's permit a priority and will carry out an environmental assessment. They announced those plans after critics, including a former Forest Service biologist, raised concerns in emails and letters, and after The Desert Sun inquired about Nestle's permit.

During February, March and April, Forest Service officials repeatedly described Nestle's permit as "expired." But Nestle took issue with that description of the permit, saying the Forest Service had consistently informed the company that the permit remains in force while the renewal process is underway.

Since May 1, the Forest Service has been referring to the permit differently, saying in an emailed statement that under the law "certain permits for which reissuance has been timely and sufficiently requested do not expire and remain in full force and effect" until there is a final determination on an application for renewal.

Nestle insists its bottling of spring water from the national forest isn't causing any harm to the creek or the wildlife near the springs in Strawberry Canyon. The company has pointed out that a stream gauge downstream from the area has continued to record flowing water.

"To ensure our groundwater use is not more than is naturally sustainable, we only use water that naturally flows to the surface of our Arrowhead spring site," the company said in a statement on its website.

San Bernardino National Forest Supervisor Jody Noiron has said that given the severity of the drought, officials are considering whether to impose some type of "interim conditions" while they work through the permit renewal process. It's not clear what sorts of measures the Forest Service might consider adopting.

Ian James can be reached by email at ian.james@desertsun.com and on Twitter at @TDSIanJames.