By Alok Ganguly
Public Relations

It’s official – WA is going greener than ever by going blue. A new water-fountain system was installed near the entrance to the gym today, and it is a brand new way for students to grab a drink during school hours. The other of two systems will soon be installed and available on the second floor next to the yearbook room.

In order to use the water fountain, you need to have your own water bottle. The whole reason that the system was installed was to deter the use of single-use plastic water bottles by students at WA, and replace them with re-usable water bottles.

Student Council was able to provide $5,000 towards the installation of these two systems, and there was no cost for installation at WA, due to the onsite plumber working at the school. According to Principal Jim Antonelli, the cost of the two systems was in the range of $4,000, with the additional cost of the filters.

Matt Thomas, who works with Elkay Systems and is a founder of BeCause Water Benefit Corporation was excited to see how much envionmental awareness will increase at WA, saying “I think from here the awareness begins, and people can soon understand the other issues around water. ”

According to the United States Enviornmental Protection Agency, the USA throws away around 28 billion bottles and jars every year. Installing more of these systems will encourage the student body to reuse their water bottles more often. Collectively, this would be able to stop the growth of landfills and save WA lots of money on disposal of waste.

“We’ve done them at different schools, we’ve done some out in New York, [Boston University], Concord, Massachusetts, and a bunch of high schools and colleges,” said Thomas.

Prior to the installation of this water fountain, the only other local system of this kind was available in Concord, a town that also banned the purchase of plastic water bottles last year.

Emily Wood, a senior at WA, who is on internship with Sustainable Westford, an organization committed to the environmental protection of Westford, was the driving force behind the installment of these water fountains.

After taking an online environmental science class, Wood came to the realization that a large portion of the community did not know about the single use water bottle issue, and decided to focus her internship on raising awareness. She partnered with Sustainable Westford, and was able to work with Gloria Gilbert, who recommended the installment of the systems into the high school. Wood was able to get all of the work to make this happen done in a mere six weeks.

“Emily was the fastest student we have ever worked with, as far as implementation, getting this together, accessing student council, setting up meetings, [and] working with Sustainable Westford,” said Thomas.

Wood even began working on the project before internships had begun. According to Gilbert, Wood approached her two months before internships began to begin contacting the appropriate people for the job.

It had a lot to do with [the school’s] support and it has a lot to do with [Thomas’s] support. If the will was not there, it would have been a much harder move,” said Gilbert.

Dennis Galvin, Vice Chairman of the Westford Planning Board, was invited to the event by Gilbert, and was in favor of the new fountains.

“This is a great idea. My own kids used to take water bottles in their knapsacks and everything else, so I don’t think its a big transition for [students] to do it, I think they have already been broken into it,” said Galvin.

On the system itself, there is a ticker counting the amount of plastic water bottles that would have been wasted each time another water bottle is filled. After one day of use, the counter was already over 100 bottles saved. Soon, the counter will be available for online viewing on both Sustainable Westford’s website and the Westford Academy homepage.

Wood is looking forward to the new oppurtunities that the installment of the Elkay system will open up for WA to reduce its carbon footprint.

“I know that this initiative will expand, and you will see systems like this around town, in schools, and I would love to come back and work on it further,” said Wood.