Glad I Bought Klean Kanteens

If this is the only green site you go to, well, first thanks and second you may not have heard the Sigg water bottle bru-ha-ha.

What it is is that Sigg had been saying that their “proprietary” (as in they won’t actually tell you) liners to their bottles were "totally inert and imparts absolutely no chemicals into the beverage." Which people took to mean that they didn’t contain BPA, the hormone disrupting chemical that they were giving up plastic water bottles to avoid.

Well it turns out that, technically, that wasn’t exactly true. The original liners had trace amounts of BPA in them but tests conducted showed no leaching of BPA into the liquids in the bottle. So apparently they were perfectly safe. Which to me begs the question, if the old liners were so safe why did they change them and are now making a big deal about the fact that they're BPA free?

Now for me it’s not as much about the safety, which of course is important, it’s the fact that the reason people bought them was because they believed that the bottles didn’t contain BPA. Fine, Sigg never claimed that they didn’t, but I think they knew perfectly well that that’s what people would assume. Otherwise they would have said that their bottles contained trace amounts of BPA but when tested didn’t leach into the liquid.

Nena Baker author of “The Body Toxic: How the Hazardous Chemistry of Everyday Things Threatens Our Health and Well-being” calls it “greenwashing at its worst”. I think I have to agree. If they really didn’t think there was anything wrong with their bottles they wouldn’t have hid behind “proprietary” information.

I don’t actually have a Sigg bottle I bought Klean Kanteen bottles instead. A decision I’m very glad I made now.

If you would like to exchange your old Sigg bottle for a new one you can send an email to info@mysigg.com asking where to send it, but you will be responsible for shipping charges. If not I would recommend Klean Kanteen bottles, I’ve been very happy with ours.

For more info on the Sigg story go here or to the Sigg site.