Bottled water in public schools and city buildings will soon be a thing of the past.

At a Board of Aldermen meeting Monday night, a ban on city use of bottled water, the brainchild of Ward 10 Alderman Justin Elicker FES ’10 SOM ’10, passed unanimously, the New Haven Independent reported Tuesday.

The city’s bottled water is trucked down Interstate 91 from Worcester, Mass., Elicker said at a Feb. 15 meeting, which creates unnecessary pollution. Most plastic bottles in the city are incinerated, he added, and many are “littering our parks, floating in our rivers, and polluting the Long Island Sound.”

At the same meeting Monday night, alderman also unanimously approved the construction of a fuel cell to power City Hall, the Independent reported.

According to Giovanni Zinn, a consultant with the city’s sustainability office, the fuel cell will save the city up to $1.3 million over the next ten years. The cell will provide energy for almost all of City Hall and the Hall of Record’s electricity, 60 percent of their heating load, and 30 percent of their cooling load, Zinn said.

The fuel cell is scheduled to be built this summer and in operation by 2012.