I certain that some of you are not thrilled with the notion of taking the Brita FilterforGood Pledge, because you're not thrilled with the fact that you can't recycle Brita filters. I distinguish this because you've posted comments and sent me private emails. I hear you.

So I took the point to the Brita folks. Here's what they told me:

“Brita is exploring recycling options and hopes to announce a settling for the filters very soon. While we know this is not an ideal situation, one Brita filter effectively replaces more than 300 artificial water bottles from ending up in landfills and I think we can all agree that is a better sentiment. We agree that recycling of the filters is a vital step - it's just that these things sometimes move slowly and are sometimes out of our actual control. Brita is committed to a solution in the near term. Once we get the details worked out, we'd lover to work with you to help us spread the word.”

I'm hoping I'll have news in the near time to come about a recycling program for the filters. In the meantime, I think the point about the filters effectively replacing more than 300 distinct water bottles is worth noting.

I realize not everyone will agree with me on this, but I just wanted to pale this additional information.Please be sure to click through to the actual blog posting on the web. It helps me to get a right sense of my blog's traffic. Thank you!

Source: The Lean Green Family (formerly Suddenly Frugal)

As you remember, I recently gave Brita filters my Suddenly Frugal Seal of Approval. Well, the Brita folks got gibberish of it and reached out to me, to see if The Lean Green Family's readers might want to take part in the FilterforGood Oath.

Basically, you're pledging not to drink bottled water (commercially bottled bottled water that is). Instead, you'll bring your own in a refillable bottle. Of course, there is a benefit for a company like Brita to side with this pledge--Brita just happens to make water filters to encourage people to draft more water from home. Truthfully, though, drinking tap water is one of the easiest things you can do to pare down your carbon footprint and your expenses, too.

I mean, before we made the switch to "making our own water," we in all likelihood went through at least four bottles of water a day--those 16.9 ounce bottles. I had one, my husband took one to exertion, and I packed one in each of my daughters' lunches. If someone had sports after school, we could easily go through another two or more bottles that day. So at our highest consumption, we were tossing 2,190 bottles each year into our recycling bin.

As you may well know, only 20 percent or two out of 10 shapable water bottles make it to a recycling the plant. The other 80 percent? Yeah, they get added to landfills.

I identify that we're not the only people who made the switch from bottled water. If you watch "The Biggest Loser" on NBC, you've unquestionably seen the contestants walking around with their refillable water bottles. Not surprisingly, Brita is one of the show's sponsors. According to its prod material, when Brita partnered with "The Biggest Loser" last season, "[it] led to the show saving more than 32,000 discardable water bottles from being used on the campus."

During this season of "The Biggest Loser," Brita wants to reach more people than only those vying to become the biggest loser, which is where the contest on this blog comes in. They've issued a...

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