Tap water for drinking is effectively almost free, and free water fountains are indeed ubiquitous. It's the two 30-minute showers a day that kill your parents water (and heating) bills.
> Tap water for drinking is effectively almost free
The average 2013 annual water rates bill in England is £390, or $650.
> and free water fountains are indeed ubiquitous
I've just been on a day-trip to England, through two major regional airports. I paid about £12 in total for bottled water during the day, suffering inflated airport shop prices, because there was not a single water fountain ( I asked ). Average price of a 750 ml bottle was around £2.20 and I had to gulp-and-chuck frequently due to passing through security three times.
> The average 2013 annual water rates bill in England is £390, or $650.
Most of which is non-drinking uses of water, such as bathing, washing, dishwashing, cleaning, flushing, garden irrigation, filling the pool etc.
I just paid £170 (IIRC, I don't have the bill handy, but around that amount) for 65 m^3 of water. That's £.0026 per liter. The general recommendation is for an adult to drink 2 liters of water a day and let's say an average english family has four adults that get all their daily liquid intake from the home tap (safely overestimating, I think you'll agree), that's £7.60 a year. I'm sticking with "almost free".
> ... also coffee is almost entirely water... so by your logic it's "almost free" as well.
No, not by my logic, not by anyone's logic. Almost the entire price of a cup of coffee covers the "bean" and "labour" part of it. The contribution of the cost of the water to the final cost of a cup of coffee is ... almost nothing at all.
you pay yourself to put a pot of coffee on at home? I thought you were talking about tap water? A 10-cup pot of coffee at home is like $0.10 of ground beans. I meant that is pretty close to how "free" my tap water is.
