Introducing… Refill Eastbourne
The Refill campaign in Eastbourne is run by Plastic Free Eastbourne, led by Refill Coordinator Oliver Sterno. Refill Eastbourne is working hard to expand their network of Refill Stations, encouraging the many visitors to the area to bring reusable water bottles to refill rather than buy bottled water. Eastbourne is proud to be home of the first National Trust property to become a Refill Station ~ Birling Gap on the South Downs. Water is a hot topic in Eastbourne and their downlands are a precious resource of it, with a chalk aquifer that provides the town with about 75% of its fresh drinking water.
A Plastic Free Community
Refill Eastbourne have been busy promoting and publicising their expanding network of Refill Stations, which now stands at 14, with another 5 in the pipeline. Some of these can be found in popular tourist areas including across the seafront "Spring Water Way". Recent refill stations are made from recycled discarded fishing net in the shape of Dolphins.
The Spring Water Festival
Every year in May, Plastic Free Eastbourne hosts their annual Spring Water Festival, which celebrates water and promotes their network of Refill Stations. It provides a fantastic opportunity to raise awareness and encourage residents and visitors alike to refill reusable water bottles and reduce the amount of single use plastic that will end up littering the local environment. The festival features a host of events for all ages and interests, including walks visiting the Refill Stations along Spring Water Way, beach cleans, pilgrimages, art exhibitions, yoga, film screenings, and health and wellbeing events.
Refill Eastbourne’s Top Takeaway:
Choose reusable drinking bottles over single-use plastic bottles, which you can then refill with mains water from our Refill Stations while on-the-go. The more people who use these Refill Stations, the less plastic debris is created in our environment.
Chilly’s & Refill are working together to spread the Refill Revolution across the UK, providing communities with the tools they need to create lasting change in their community, including individuals, community groups, local authorities and governments.
Chilly’s has been working with Refill since 2018, and by 2022, had donated nearly £700,000 to support Refill in achieving its work, and some of this funding has been used to support some of the 400-strong network of local community and council-led Refill Schemes. The Refill campaign helps hundreds of thousands of people to take action where they live.
This series celebrates some of the incredible Refill community programs out there on the ground helping us to turn the tide on plastic pollution – these are our Refill Heroes.
Get Involved
Spread the word about the campaign and the network of local Refill Stations in Eastbourne. For more information about Refill Eastbourne visit:
https://www.instagram.com/plasticfreeeastbourne/
https://www.facebook.com/RefillEastbourne
https://twitter.com/RefillEB
Find a Refill Scheme near you –
Refill Schemes | Refill | find a scheme and Join the Refill Revolution .