Join the Soda Club USA
I spent the summer of of 2007 living with my girlfriend in Germany, where, like other parts of Europe, fizzy water is the norm. In fact, the town we were in (Aachen) had its own springs, and the bottled water we preferred to drink was bottled right there in Aachen, was super-inexpensive, and delivered to the supermarket in returnable glass bottles which were actually cleaned and reused, as opposed to being melted down and recycled. Compare this almost-environmentally-ideal situation, which required little to no transportation of bottles or water, and no extra consumption of fuel to break down / reblow plastic bottles, to the ‘morally reprehensible’ (as some call it) procedure that Fiji water must undergo to get from the pristine Fijian aquifer in the Pacific isles to the hands of some North American yuppy trolling the refrigeration aisles of Whole Foods looking for water that “came from, like, Africa or some country in India or something.”
(While I specifically pick on the debate over Fiji Water, the company actually does much more than many others towards promoting sustainability in the area of Fiji (the Yagara Valley region of Viti Levu) and pledged to make their operations carbon negative by the beginning of this year. They also have an ambitious plan for even loftier goals of sustainability by 2010. If nothing else, they’re raising awareness.)
A couple months back, I came across a teeny writeup in Good Magazine for a product called “Soda Club USA,” which purportedly lets you make fizzy water in the comfort of your own home. After that summer, we definitely missed the accessibility of good, cheap sparkling water, and buying incredibly expensive bottled water, such as San Pellegrino, is not a sustainable solution from either an economic or environmental perspective. Upon reading the writeup, I immediately ordered a Soda Club USA.
For $130 (sale price, though they always seem to have some kind of sale going on), you get four special hermetically-sealable, reusable 1-liter plastic bottles, the soda maker itself, two carbonating cartridges capable of making 120 liters of soda each (!!), and a variety pack of soda flavors (lemon-lime, cola, root beer, etc.). When you’ve squeezed every last molecule of CO2 from your carbonation cartridge, like an old-timey milk service, the Soda Club USA truck will come to your house and the congenial, mustachioed soda man will replace your empty cartridge for $20.
You use the water that comes straight out of your tap (possibly run through a Brita, depending on the quality in your area), so this part is essentially free. The soda maker uses no electricity or batteries — all it does is really is serve as an interface/control between the bottle and the carbonator cartridge. This is the other great benefit
- you get to decide how many bubbles you want in your water! This thing is hand-powered, so the number of times you press the carbonation button determines the amount of CO2 that is released into your water. Want just a light tingle on the tongue? That’s just one zap. Want to feel the bite in your sinuses? Try four or five zaps. I don’t use the flavor packets at all, but my girlfriend and I are pretty avid fizz water drinkers, probably going through at least a liter or two a day. One great trick we’ve learned is to buy juice concentrates (apple works well, white grape is great too) and drop a tablespoon or three into your water for an italian-soda style deal. Refreshing and a fraction of the calories as a comparable size glass of juice, for those who care about such things.
If you’re at all inclined to drinking fizz water or soda, I really can’t recommend this product enough. It helps saves you money, lets you control what you put in your body, and, perhaps most important of all, gives you the right to tell your friends that you’re in the Soda Club USA. So go buy one, and let the only carbon emissions caused by the your soda habit be the ones you burp out 
Check out some photos of our unboxing (unbottling?):
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