• The average cost to install a bottle-filling station is in the range of $4,000 to $4500. Cost depends on proximity of adjacent plumbing and electrical services. Average annual maintenance costs are in the range of $600 to $650 per year, although this is variable based on usage. Low-usage units will cost less; high usage (high traffic) units will require more frequent maintenance and can run as high as $2,500 per year.
• Requests for refill stations in your office unit should be made through your designated Facilities Coordinator.

• Annually, Penn Staters recycle over 200 tons of plastic bottles (approximately 7.6 million water bottles).
• In the United States, only about 24 percent of disposable plastic bottles are recycled.
• At that rate, approximately 600 tons of bottles are sent to the landfill – sitting there for hundreds of years.

Disposable water bottles consume important resources: petroleum and water. As calculated by the Pacific Institute, in 2006, Americans bought 30 billion plastic water bottles, made from 17 million barrels of petroleum; if transportation of bottles was added to the calculation, this number rises to 50 million barrels of oil annually. Further, to produce these bottles requires three times the volume in water, not counting the water inside each bottle. Finally, bottled water also requires energy throughout its life cycle: to capture, treat and send water to the bottling plant; to fill, package, transport and refrigerate the bottled water; and recycle or dispose of the empty containers.