Water Footprint: A critical review using sugar production as an example

2012 ◽  
pp. 159-168 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carlos Nähle ◽  
Markwart Kunz
Keyword(s):  
Water Management ◽  
Sugar Beet ◽  
Water Consumption ◽  
Critical Review ◽  
Water Footprint ◽  
Sugar Production ◽  
Numerical Indicator ◽  
The Individual

This article deals with the numerical indicator water footprint. The definitions and terminology used in this indicator are analyzed in terms of their importance for water management. The individual components of the water footprint – blue, green, grey – are discussed in terms of their determination especially in relation to the aspects of evapotranspiration and fertilization. Using the example of sugar (beet and sugar production), it is shown that the determined water “consumption” with this indicator is only virtual and does not correspond to reality. Improvements in water management can only be achieved through key figures that can be actively influenced. This is very questionable in the case of the indicator water footprint.

scholarly journals The water footprint of the sugarcane agro-industry in the Northeast region of Brazil

2019 ◽  
pp. 1203-1210
Author(s):  
Gabrielle de Araújo Ribeiro ◽  
José Dantas Neto ◽  
Marcos Ferreira de Mendonça
Keyword(s):  
Water Management ◽  
Water Footprint ◽  
Meteorological Data ◽  
Sprinkler Irrigation ◽  
Production Cycle ◽  
Sugar Production ◽  
Important Indicator ◽  
Northeast Region ◽  
Production Processes ◽  
Production Period

The water footprint (WF) is an important indicator for water management, as it identifies the amount of water used directly and indirectly by a consumer or a product. The objective of this study is to analyze the sugarcane industry's WF in Brazil's Northeast region for the 2016/17 and 2017/18 harvest seasons. The blue, green and grey WFs of sugarcane were quantified, as well as the blue WFs of the production processes of ethanol and sugar, the main subproducts of sugarcane for both harvests. The work was carried out in an area with 18.42 hectares of sugarcane crops under sprinkler irrigation. The process of sugarcane production and use of pesticides was surveyed and meteorological data for the production period was collected. Right after, mathematical models were used to estimate the blue, green and grey WFs. The WF of the sugarcane was found to be 2,364.87 m³ t-1 and 1,043.92 m³ t-1 for the first and second harvest, respectively. The grey WF made up the largest part of this value, mostly due to use of the pesticides Diuron 800 and Imazapic. The processes of ethanol and sugar production, meanwhile, were found to have a blue WF of approximately 10 m³ t-1 and 5 m³ t-1, respectively. From these results, we can conclude that the WF is an effective indicator for monitoring water use in the production cycle of sugarcane and its subproducts, and that the use of fewer polluting pesticides would aid in reducing the WF of this cycle.

scholarly journals Water footprint assessment for citizens in Ho Chi Minh city

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. first
Author(s):  
Truong Thanh Canh ◽  
Thuy-Trang Thi Nguyen ◽  
Anh Hoang Le
Keyword(s):  
Water Consumption ◽  
Urban Areas ◽  
Water Footprint ◽  
Agricultural Products ◽  
Green Water ◽  
Ho Chi Minh City ◽  
Eating Habit ◽  
Agriculture Industry ◽  
The Individual ◽  
And Behavior

The research conducted a survey of the water consumption in Ho Chi Minh City through the consumption of products from agriculture, industry and domestic. The research identified green water, blue water and grey water footprints in consuming products. Then personal water footprints were calculated and evaluated. The results showed that the average personal water footprint in district 3 was 1556 m3/year (77.15% for agriculture, 15.59% for industry and 7.26% for domestic), district 10 was 1587 m3/year (77.58% for agriculture, 15.17% for industry and 7.25% domestic), Nha Be district is 1681 m3/year (80.48% for agriculture, 12.97% for industry and 6.55% for domestic) and Binh Chanh district was 1744 m3/year (81.57% for agriculture, 11.88% for industry and 6.55% for domestic). In the individual components of the water footprint, water footprints in consuming agricultural products accounted for the major percentage and determined the personal water footprint. The results showed that the individual water footprints in countryside areas were higher than those in urban areas. Depending on the amount and forms of each individual's consumption, their eating habit and daily activities, and the sexes, the personal water footprints were different. The perception and behavior of individuals' water consumption also significantly influenced the overall personal water footprints.

Water Footprint

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maite M. Aldaya ◽  
M. Ramón Llamas ◽  
Arjen Y. Hoekstra
Keyword(s):  
Water Management ◽  
Supply Chain ◽  
Life Cycle ◽  
Water Resources ◽  
Supply Chains ◽  
Water Use ◽  
Water Consumption ◽  
Water Footprint ◽  
Green Water ◽  
Blue Water

This is an advance summary of a forthcoming article in the Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Environmental Science. Please check back later for the full article. The water footprint concept broadens the scope of traditional national and corporate water accounting as it has been previously known. It highlights the ways in which water consuming and polluting activities relate to the structure of the global economy, opening a window of opportunity to increase transparency and improve water management along whole-production and supply chains. This concept adds a new dimension to integrated water resources management in a globalized world. The water footprint is a relatively recent indicator. Created in 2002, it aims to quantify the effect of consumption and trade on the use of water resources. Specifically, the water footprint is an indicator of freshwater use that considers both direct and indirect water use of a consumer or producer. For instance, the water footprint of a product refers to the volume of freshwater used to produce the product, tracing the origin of raw material and ingredients along their respective supply chains. This novel indirect component of water use in supply chains is, in many cases, the greatest share of water use, for example, in the food and beverage sector and the apparel industry. Water footprint assessment shows the full water balance, with water consumption and pollution components specified geographically and temporally and with water consumption specified by type of source (e.g., rainwater, groundwater, or surface water). It introduces three components: 1. The blue water footprint refers to the consumption of blue water resources (i.e., surface and groundwater including natural freshwater lakes, manmade reservoirs, rivers, and aquifers) along the supply chain of a product, versus the traditional and restricted water withdrawal measure. 2. The green water footprint refers to consumption through transpiration or evaporation of green water resources (i.e., soilwater originating from rainwater). Green water maintains natural vegetation (e.g., forests, meadows, scrubland, tundra) and rain-fed agriculture, yet plays an important role in most irrigated agriculture as well. Importantly, this kind of water is not quantified in most traditional agricultural water use analyses. 3. The grey water footprint refers to pollution and is defined as the volume of freshwater that is required to assimilate the load of pollutants given natural concentrations for naturally occurring substances and existing ambient water-quality standards. The water footprint concept has been incorporated into public policies and international standards. In 2011, the Water Footprint Network adopted the Water Footprint Assessment Manual, which provides a standardized method and guidelines. In 2014, the International Organization for Standardization adopted a life cycle-based ISO 14046 standard for the water footprint; it offers guidelines to integrate water footprint analysis in life-cycle assessment for products. In practice, water footprint assessment generally results in increased awareness of critical elements in a supply chain, such as hotspots that deserve most attention, and what can be done to improve water management in those hotspots. Water footprint assessment, including the estimation of virtual water trade, applied in different countries and contexts, is producing new data and bringing larger perspectives that, in many cases, lead to a better understanding of the drivers behind water scarcity.

scholarly journals The Water–Economy Nexus of Beef Produced from Different Cattle Breeds

Water ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (18) ◽  
pp. 2513
Author(s):  
Frikkie Alberts Maré
Keyword(s):  
Water Consumption ◽  
Value Chain ◽  
Water Footprint ◽  
Economic Value ◽  
Sustainable Use ◽  
Production Method ◽  
Value Addition ◽  
Bottom Up ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Economic Value Addition

The sustainable use of water, or any other natural resource for that matter, is not the only factor that should be considered in terms of sustainability, as social equity and economic prosperity are equally important. The objective of this study was to analyse different breeds of beef cattle, following the same production method, in terms of their water footprint and economic value addition for different links in the value chain. A bottom-up approach was applied to identify the breed with the best economic water consumption in terms of beef production. The results indicated that the total WF/kg carcass revealed notable differences between the various breeds. The Bonsmara had the smallest WF/kg carcass, while the Limousin had the largest. The WF/kg of beef for the different cuts (rib eye, topside, and flank) showed large variations between the breeds and between the different cuts of beef from the same breed. In terms of the economic water consumption, the Angus consumed between 4% and 25% less water per rand of economic value addition than the Bonsmara, Simmentaler, Simbra, Limousin, Afrikaner, and Brahman. When the economic water consumption of the individual value links was considered, it was found that Bonsmara had the best figures for cow–calf production, while the Limousin and Simmentaler were the best in terms of feedlot finishing and processing, respectively. These contradicting results showed the importance of a bottom-up approach to ensure that the fallacy of division does not occur and, secondly, that possible problem areas in the value chain are identified and addressed separately.

scholarly journals Water Footprint, Blue Water Scarcity, and Economic Water Productivity of Irrigated Crops in Peshawar Basin, Pakistan

Water ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (9) ◽  
pp. 1249
Author(s):  
Tariq Khan ◽  
Hamideh Nouri ◽  
Martijn J. Booij ◽  
Arjen Y. Hoekstra ◽  
Hizbullah Khan ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Surface Water ◽  
Sugar Beet ◽  
Water Consumption ◽  
Water Scarcity ◽  
Water Footprint ◽  
Water Productivity ◽  
Green Water ◽  
Blue Water ◽  
Annual Consumption ◽  
Peshawar Basin

Pakistan possesses the fourth largest irrigation network in the world, serving 20.2 million hectares of cultivated land. With an increasing irrigated area, Pakistan is short of freshwater resources and faces severe water scarcity and food security challenges. This is the first comprehensive study on the water footprint (WF) of crop production in Peshawar Basin. WF is defined as the volume of freshwater required to produce goods and services. In this study, we assessed the blue and green water footprints (WFs) and annual blue and green water consumption of major crops (maize, rice, tobacco, wheat, barley, sugarcane, and sugar beet) in Peshawar Basin, Pakistan. The Global Water Footprint Assessment Standard (GWFAS) and AquaCrop model were used to model the daily WF of each crop from 1986 to 2015. In addition, the blue water scarcity, in the context of available surface water, and economic water productivity (EWP) of these crops were assessed. The 30 year average blue and green WFs of major crops revealed that maize had the highest blue and green WFs (7077 and 2744 m3/ton, respectively) and sugarcane had the lowest blue and green WFs (174 and 45 m3/ton, respectively). The average annual consumption of blue water by major crops in the basin was 1.9 billion m3, where 67% was used for sugarcane and maize, covering 48% of the cropland. The average annual consumption of green water was 1.0 billion m3, where 68% was used for wheat and sugarcane, covering 67% of the cropland. The WFs of all crops exceeded the global average. The results showed that annually the basin is supplied with 30 billion m3 of freshwater. Annually, 3 billion m3 of freshwater leaves the basin unutilized. The average annual blue water consumption by major crops is 31% of the total available surface water (6 billion m3) in the basin. Tobacco and sugar beet had the highest blue and green EWP while wheat and maize had the lowest. The findings of this study can help the water management authorities in formulating a comprehensive policy for efficient utilization of available water resources in Peshawar Basin.

Excellent environmental performance of beet sugar production in the Netherlands

2020 ◽  
pp. 161-165
Author(s):  
Bertram de Crom ◽  
Jasper Scholten ◽  
Janjoris van Diepen
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Land Use ◽  
Life Cycle ◽  
Environmental Impact ◽  
Water Consumption ◽  
Environmental Performance ◽  
Cane Sugar ◽  
Sugar Production ◽  
Beet Sugar ◽  
Glucose Syrup

To get more insight in the environmental performance of the Suiker Unie beet sugar, Blonk Consultants performed a comparative Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) study on beet sugar, cane sugar and glucose syrup. The system boundaries of the sugar life cycle are set from cradle to regional storage at the Dutch market. For this study 8 different scenarios were evaluated. The first scenario is the actual sugar production at Suiker Unie. Scenario 2 until 7 are different cane sugar scenarios (different countries of origin, surplus electricity production and pre-harvest burning of leaves are considered). Scenario 8 concerns the glucose syrup scenario. An important factor in the environmental impact of 1kg of sugar is the sugar yield per ha. Total sugar yield per ha differs from 9t/ha sugar for sugarcane to 15t/ha sugar for sugar beet (in 2017). Main conclusion is that the production of beet sugar at Suiker Unie has in general a lower impact on climate change, fine particulate matter, land use and water consumption, compared to cane sugar production (in Brazil and India) and glucose syrup. The impact of cane sugar production on climate change and water consumption is highly dependent on the country of origin, especially when land use change is taken into account. The environmental impact of sugar production is highly dependent on the co-production of bioenergy, both for beet and cane sugar.

scholarly journals Water Footprint and Life Cycle Assessment: The Complementary Strengths of Analyzing Global Freshwater Appropriation and Resulting Local Impacts

Water ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (6) ◽  
pp. 803
Author(s):  
Winnie Gerbens-Leenes ◽  
Markus Berger ◽  
John Anthony Allan
Keyword(s):  
Life Cycle Assessment ◽  
Life Cycle ◽  
Water Consumption ◽  
Water Footprint ◽  
Local Impacts ◽  
Global Water

Considering that 4 billion people are living in water-stressed regions and that global water consumption is predicted to increase continuously [...]

scholarly journals Agro-economic and socio-environmental assessments of food and virtual water trades of Iran

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Fatemeh Karandish ◽  
Hamideh Nouri ◽  
Marcela Brugnach
Keyword(s):  
Food Security ◽  
Water Consumption ◽  
Crop Production ◽  
Water Footprint ◽  
Virtual Water ◽  
Environmental Indicators ◽  
Blue Water ◽  
Water Crisis ◽  
Food Trade ◽  
Water Limitations

AbstractEnding hunger and ensuring food security are among targets of 2030’s SDGs. While food trade and the embedded (virtual) water (VW) may improve food availability and accessibility for more people all year round, the sustainability and efficiency of food and VW trade needs to be revisited. In this research, we assess the sustainability and efficiency of food and VW trades under two food security scenarios for Iran, a country suffering from an escalating water crisis. These scenarios are (1) Individual Crop Food Security (ICFS), which restricts calorie fulfillment from individual crops and (2) Crop Category Food Security (CCFS), which promotes “eating local” by suggesting food substitution within the crop category. To this end, we simulate the water footprint and VW trades of 27 major crops, within 8 crop categories, in 30 provinces of Iran (2005–2015). We investigate the impacts of these two scenarios on (a) provincial food security (FSp) and exports; (b) sustainable and efficient blue water consumption, and (c) blue VW export. We then test the correlation between agro-economic and socio-environmental indicators and provincial food security. Our results show that most provinces were threatened by unsustainable and inefficient blue water consumption for crop production, particularly in the summertime. This water mismanagement results in 14.41 and 8.45 billion m3 y−1 unsustainable and inefficient blue VW exports under ICFS. “Eating local” improves the FSp value by up to 210% which lessens the unsustainable and inefficient blue VW export from hotspots. As illustrated in the graphical abstract, the FSp value strongly correlates with different agro-economic and socio-environmental indicators, but in different ways. Our findings promote “eating local” besides improving agro-economic and socio-environmental conditions to take transformative steps toward eradicating food insecurity not only in Iran but also in other countries facing water limitations.

The Decomposition Analysis of Tourism Water Footprint in Taiwan: Revealing Decision-Relevant Information

2018 ◽  
Vol 58 (4) ◽  
pp. 695-708 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ya-Yen Sun ◽  
Ching-Mai Hsu
Keyword(s):  
Water Use ◽  
Water Consumption ◽  
Water Footprint ◽  
Decomposition Analysis ◽  
Economic Structure ◽  
Relevant Information ◽  
Structural Decomposition Analysis ◽  
Total Consumption ◽  
Economic Output ◽  
Input Structure

Tourism water consumption reflects the dynamics between the visitation volume, economic structure, and water use technology of a destination. This paper presents a structural decomposition analysis that attributes changes of Taiwan’s tourism water footprint into the demand factors of total consumption and purchasing patterns, and production factors of the industry input structure and water use technology. From 2006 to 2011, Taiwan experienced a 48% growth in visitor expenditures and a 74% surge in its water footprint. Diseconomies of scale were observed, with a 1% increase in consumption leading to a 1.5% increase in the tourism water footprint. A strong preference by visitors for water-intensive goods and services and a changing economic structure requiring more water input for tourism establishments and supply chain members contributed to this worrisome pattern. The water requirements received only a minimal offset effect with technological improvements. Decoupling tourism water consumption from economic output is currently unattainable.

scholarly journals Global Water Crisis: Concept of a New Interactive Shower Panel Based on IoT and Cloud Computing for Rational Water Consumption

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (9) ◽  
pp. 4081
Author(s):  
Adrian Czajkowski ◽  
Leszek Remiorz ◽  
Sebastian Pawlak ◽  
Eryk Remiorz ◽  
Jakub Szyguła ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Water Management ◽  
Water Resources ◽  
Water Consumption ◽  
Circular Economy ◽  
Potable Water ◽  
Raw Material ◽  
Energy Industry ◽  
Energy Transformation ◽  
Flow Measurements ◽  
Essential Resource

The present paper describes the problem and effects of water scarcity and the possibility of rational use of this resource in the idea of a Circular Economy (CE) and sustainable development. Rational water management requires innovation, due to the growing demand for this raw material. It seems that water is widely available, e.g., in Poland, there is no problem with drought. Unfortunately, Polish water resources are shrinking and modern solutions, as well as the construction of new and modernisation of old infrastructure, are some of the few solutions that can protect against a shortage of potable water. Water is also an essential resource for economic development. It is used in every sector of the economy. Limited water resources lead to an inevitable energy transformation because, in its present state, the Polish energy industry consumes huge amounts of water. Due to the above statements, the authors propose a solution in the form of an interactive shower panel that contributes to more rational water management (e.g., in households or hotels) based on the latest technological achievements. This device enables the creation of water consumption statistics based on accurate liquid flow measurements and the transfer of data to the user’s mobile device. This innovation aims to make the user aware of the amount of water used, which in turn can contribute to lower water consumption.

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