In addition, waste management has become a large problem in Sudan, with landfills growing to enormous sizes and recycling rates remaining almost non existent. The number of plastic bottles produced by the bottled water industry and subsequently discarded by consumers has only exacerbated this problem.
On a global level, according to a 2001 report of the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), roughly 1.5 million tons of plastic are expended in the bottling of 89 billion liters of water each year.
Besides the sheer number of plastic bottles produced each year, the energy required to manufacture and transport these bottles to market severely drains limited fossil fuels. Bottled water companies, due to their unregulated use of valuable resources and their production of billions of plastic bottles have presented a significant strain on the environment.