A CAMPAIGN, which began life in Bude, has attracted the support of water companies and retailers nationwide.

The ReFill initiative was launched in the seaside town by local resident Deb Rosser with support from BeachCare, a partnership between Keep Britain Tidy and South West Water, in 2014.

The idea was simple: instead of buying bottled water, people refill reusable bottles with tap water supplied for free by participating cafes, restaurants and other businesses.

Supported by South West Water, Your Shore Beach Rangers, Clean Cornwall and the Cornwall Wildlife Trust, ReFill Cornwall has set up groups and supplied bottles in Bude, Polzeath, Newquay, Fowey, Looe, St Austell, Falmouth , Helford, Mounts Bay, St Agnes, Porthleven, Portreath and Truro.

The county now has almost 200 registered ReFill sites. ReFill Devon was launched in 2016 by Recycle Devon and has 164 ReFill sites in Exeter, Kingsbridge, Plymouth, Totnes and Torquay.

Soon people will be able to refill water bottles for free in tens of thousands of places across England following the announcement of a new national scheme by the water industry on Thursday, January 25.

In an ambitious drive to help fight plastic waste, water companies will join forces with the ReFill campaign to create a national network of high street retailers, coffee shops, businesses and local authorities offering new refill stations for the public to top-up their water bottles for free in every major city and town in England by 2021.

People can use an app on their phone to find out where the nearest refill point is, or look out for special signs in shop windows.

It is estimated that the new scheme will cut plastic bottle use by tens of millions each year as well as substantially increasing the availability of high quality drinking water.

The first business to join the national drinking water scheme is Whitbread plc, which has pledged today to offer free drinking water for customers and passers-by in each of its 3,000 Costa Coffee and Premier Inn locations from March 2018.

The new partnership between the water industry and ReFill will see all water companies in England support the massive expansion of the scheme over the next two years.

The first stage in delivering the nationwide scheme is for water companies to work with ReFill to develop local action plans by September 2018, setting out steps they will take – working with local partners – to drive up access to drinking water locally. This will include the number of refill stations to be available.

ReFill founder, Deb Rosser, said: “It is absolutely fantastic to see water companies and big businesses across the country get behind this idea. It’s so simple, but it has been extremely effective in reducing plastic use and encouraging everyone to do their bit for the environment.”

Ed Mitchell, director of environment at Pennon Group, owner of South West Water, said: “It’s great to see this partnership developing, as further steps are taken to combat plastic pollution.”

Neil Hembrow, BeachCare manager South West, said: “Single-use plastic bottles are expensive to produce, use up valuable natural resources to make and transport, and create mountains of waste once they’ve been used and discarded.

“It’s estimated that only around half of the 38.5-million plastic bottles used in the UK every day are recycled, with around 16-million ending up in landfill, being burnt, or entering the environment and waterways.

“The South West is leading the way in tackling this important issue.”