Traveling by airplane can be a stressful experience, especially if you’ve got a long layover, long flight, are a relatively inexperienced traveler or are traveling with kids. I’m always interested to see what airports are doing to enhance the traveler experience. Recently, I saw an article talking about some of the changes that LAX airport has implemented.
LAX Banning Single-Use Water Bottles
LAX announced back at the end of June that they are banning the sale of single-use water bottles.
I only saw the announcement a couple of weeks ago but apparently (As of the June 30, 2023 Facebook post above), it went into effect at the end of June, so it is already in place as of the writing of this post. LAX (as far as I could tell) now becomes the 2nd major airport to ban the sale of single-use water bottles, after SFO, which banned the sale of single-use plastic water bottles in 2019 and included other types of beverages as of 2021.
Why Is LAX Banning Single-Use Water Bottles
The ban on the sale of single-use water bottles is, as you might have guessed, part of a sustainability initiative. LAX falls under the Los Angeles World Airports (LAWA) commission, and LAWA has a sustainability initiative, including the goal to make its airports entirely zero-waste by 2045. The explanation from the airport authority were that there are plenty of water bottle filling stations throughout the airport, though that is a disputed fact by anyone who is ever actually FLOWN through LAX.
Does the LAX Water Ban Make Sense?
To say that the comments on the Facebook above were not supportive would be an understatement. Here are a few of the comments
To recap, the airport that generates 15.7 metric tons of carbon each day just outlawed plastic bottles
and
There are not ample refill stations in T6, not even close. The ones we do have are not very sanitary either
and
TBIT doesn’t even have functioning water fountains. There is one bottle filler in the food court and it’s not filtered or cold. Bottle fillers were installed pre-security. But even most of those don’t work. Employees don’t want to pay for over-priced water either
Many people were also wondering why you would ban water bottles but not other single-use bottles and cans such as soft drinks or Gatorade. Perhaps that is something that is coming down the road – that’s what SFO did a few years ago – first banned the single-use water bottles and then followed that up with bans on other drinks a few years later.
Personally, I almost never buy or drink from single-use water bottles. Either I am bringing my own water bottle, or I’m drinking out of the water fountains.
(SEE ALSO: Do You Really NEED To Eat And Drink In The Airport?)
So I don’t personally have a problem with this, though it would be a requirement for me that there actually BE sufficient water fountains and water bottle filling stations throughout the airport, something I’m not quite sure is the case at LAX.
The Bottom Line
LAX has recently announced a ban on the sale of single-use water bottles, effective immediately. This ban includes events happening at the airport as well as vending machines. Currently, the ban does not include other bottled drinks outside of water (though that may be coming). It also does not include bottled water from flight services on aircrafts.
What do you think of this new policy at LAX? Leave your thoughts in the comments below
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Dan Miller travels with his wife and 6 (SIX!) children. He loves to help families travel for free / cheap, especially larger families. If you are looking for help, drop him an email at 
Seriously? Somehow you managed to write an entirely incorrect article, while incorporating the correct quote. LAX did not ban single use water bottles. LAX banned the *sale* of single use water bottles.
LAX should ban airplanes too…..for the environment. How about the FBO? Any private jets over there these days?
This is more liberal BS…. Absolutely ridiculous!
So, you’d rather people use those bacteria-laden steel reusable bottles, that we know the majority of people don’t clean, or if they do, they don’t to it properly.
SFO and LAX have always been a couple of crappy airports, now they’re worse!
More reason to use alternative airports, but most importantly, to vote right!
Thanks for pointing out that this was not as clear as it needed to be – I’ve clarified the post
Single use PLASTIC water bottles. So they can still sell the card board or metal just not plastic. And the metal cans of water taste better than the plastic anyway
We arrived at LAX unaware of the policy and had brought single use bottles for all four of us.We saw the notices and were happy to refill the bottles we’d brought but only ONE refill station was operational-there was a massive queue and after a fifteen minute wait,we discovered the water was barely drinkable.five minutes later,a staff member saw us drinking (reluctantly)from our refills and attempted to confiscate them,citing the new poilicy.So it’s not just the sale of,it’s the use of such bottles as well.A fifth member of our party was joining us later and brought our own refillable bottles from home-we’d normally have brought them ourselves but a last minute rush meant we’d left them sitting in the kitchen so purchased single use en route to the airport..
Also, you can buy water in metal bottles for approx $5-6, which can be single or multiple use, but so can plastic…so overall it’s just a marketing gimmick to sound like it saves the environment.
I assume it takes more energy to create the metal one, but they’re all not really that great where you want to reuse it over and over since it’s thin metal. I assume most people buying water at an airport will not plan on reusing their container no matter the vessel.
Plastic can’t really be recycled, the aluminum can be recycled infinitely
I always refill my bottle.
The liquid ban was meant to cover any container that could hold over 100ml as this was thought to stop bad people adding multiple 100ml to make a bomb
Water stations and fountains are disgusting. Pipes get dirty over time. Some water mains are over 100 years old. Do you really want to drink water from a public airport. Gross.
California leading the way in stupidity.
Yep!! Once again, and again, and again!!
Agree
LAX joining the crazy club of Calif with SFO!!! and the local water still tastes bad.. Calif get a grip and have cleaner,better water and AIR!!!
Good proposal. Drinking water promotes diuresis and there is no enough toilets in the terminals and small ones in the plane. Can you stay 5 hours without drinking water? And if you need, get a reusable water. I can’t believe this is a discussion item.
Well it’s about time they banned the “sale” of single use water bottles, so happy to read this! All that discarded plastic unnecessarily filling up our landfills & destroying our planet. Bravo LAX for taking a step forward to be environmentally cognizant. I always bring my own container and fill up at a restaurant or water station at the airports. I pray the water is filtered, it hasn’t killed me yet. Like others have said, I hope LAX has installed more water refill stations with chilled filtered water so this forward thinking ban can actually work.