A new app was launched on Oct. 23, that displays nearby clean drinking water locations so you can refill your water bottle. According to Fox 2 Now, the Tap app is available for free on Android and iOS. It highlights 32,000 refill stations across 7,100 cities in 30 countries.
The app provides profiles on locations and what they offer. For example, some places offer flavored or sparkling water and whether it comes free or at cost from a water cooler, counter service or a drinking foundation.
According to Fox 2 Now, the company spent months crowdsourcing locations around the world that are open to the public or okay with having people wander into their storefronts to ask for refill.
“Water is a mispriced public good,” said Samuel Rosen, Tap founder, to CNN Business. “I believe we, as consumers, have been robbed of our own water and sold back to us by corporations.”
Rosen is the cofounder and former CEO of storage startup MakeSpace. He left his role at the company in Nov. 2017. According to Fox 2 Now, he came up with the idea for Tap after purchasing a $5 water bottle at the airport.
The company hopes people will use their app to cut down on plastic waste and change their behavior.
According to a report from the UN Intergovernmental Panel, global warming is on track to have a disastrous impact if there are not changes by 2030. The impact could result in extreme drought, wildfires, floods and food shortages for hundreds of millions of people.
Plastic waste is a contributor to greenhouse gas emissions, according to Fox 2 Now. Eight million tons of plastic enter the water each year, and more is expected in U.S. oceans than fish by 2050.
However, the app is not the only of its kind. The nonprofit WeTap has been around for about six years and helps people find the closest public drinking fountains around them.
