· Subha Karthik · 3 min read
Lights, Dinner & Reusable Bottles: GCTS Deepavali Kondaattam 2026
Around 600 people celebrated Deepavali with Greater Cincinnati Tamil Sangam-and brought their own reusable water bottles. EcoPal partnered with GCTS so the community could skip single-use plastic, cut roughly 100 kg of CO2e, and cheer two raffle winners.
Deepavali is light, laughter, culture-and this year, for Greater Cincinnati Tamil Sangam, it was also collective climate action in real time.
On October 24, 2026, around 600 people gathered for GCTS Deepavali Kondaattam 2026. GCTS hosted a beautiful celebration and provided dinner. EcoPal partnered with GCTS and asked attendees to bring their own reusable water bottles-so we didn’t have to buy plastic water bottles for the crowd.
And the community showed up. Literally-with bottles in hand.
The ask was simple. The response was festival-sized.
Before the event, EcoPal advertised a raffle: gift cards for random winners among people who brought their own water bottle. Thirty-six people scanned in for the raffle. Two EcoPals are our gift-card winners-and we’ll be contacting them to deliver their prizes:
🎉 Raffle winners
Gift cards are on the way—thank you for bringing your bottles!
Congratulations to the winners! Thank you for bringing your bottles-and for helping set the tone for everyone else in the room.
Watch the EcoPal Promo
Relive the energy of the night:
What 600 reusable bottles mean for the planet
A standard single-use PET plastic water bottle generates approximately 80 to 160 grams of CO₂ equivalent (CO₂e) across its full lifecycle-manufacturing, transport, water processing, chilling, and waste disposal.
Using an average baseline of 120 grams (0.12 kg) of CO2e per bottle, and assuming each of the 600 attendees would have used roughly one bottle during dinner / the event:
1 bottle per person (600 bottles):
600 bottles × 0.12 kg CO2e = 72 kg CO2e By having attendees bring reusable bottles, the event saved approximately 70 to 145 kg (150–320 lbs) of CO₂ emissions-alongside avoiding 600 pieces of plastic waste from entering landfills or recycling streams.
Saving roughly 100 kg (220 lbs) of CO₂e is in the same ballpark as:
- Driving a standard gas-powered passenger car for ~250 miles (400 km)
- Burning ~110 pounds (50 kg) of coal
- The energy required to charge roughly 12,000 smartphones
That is not a small story. That is a festival choosing the lighter path-together.
Thank you-and keep inspiring others
To every attendee who packed a reusable bottle: thank you. You made dinner feel festive and responsible. You proved that culture and care for the planet belong on the same stage.
A special thank-you to the GCTS organizing committee for their warm support and partnership-this kind of community impact only happens when hosts open the door for it. Thank you to Shyam Nainamalai for creating the promo video that captured the energy of the night. And thank you to everyone who participated-dancers, volunteers, families, and neighbors-who showed up, celebrated, and carried the reusable-bottle ask with such heart.
Keep going. Keep carrying that bottle to the next gathering. Keep inviting a friend to do the same. When one household shows up with a reusable bottle, it is a habit. When hundreds do it at Deepavali Kondaattam, it is a movement.
Collective action. Lasting change. Happy Deepavali-from EcoPal, with gratitude to GCTS Organizing committee, to Shyam, and to every EcoPal in the room.
