Saguaro National Park cutting plastic bottle use

Saguaro National Park in Tucson is discontinuing the sale of disposable bottled water or soda by vending machines on site.

Officials say the park has long been committed to recycling plastic and aluminum, saving 61,500 pounds of recyclable waste from landfills in 2010 alone.

However, transporting disposable bottles to be recycled also costs money, time and gasoline.

The park could eliminate up to 40 percent of what is currently recycled and that's about 15 percent of the park's total waste stream.

Saguaro conducted an analysis of the potential impacts of eliminating the sale of disposable bottled water and soda. It determined that the more sustainable solution is to provide new water bottle filling stations for visitors to refill their own reusable containers.