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The Pacific Institute is dedicated to protecting our natural world, encouraging sustainable development and improving global security. Founded in 1987 and based in Oakland, Calif., the institute provides independent research and policy analysis and aims to find real-world solutions to problems such as water shortages, habitat destruction and global warming.
Business for Social Responsibility (BSR) has been a leading provider of innovative business solutions to many of the world's leading companies since 1992. Headquartered in San Francisco and with offices in Paris and Guangzhou, China, BSR is a nonprofit business association that serves its 250 member companies and other firms around the globe through advisory services, conferences and research.Once companies have designed water policies and goals based on their water footprint and associated risks, an action plan can be initiated to implement efficiency, reuse, innovations, partnerships and investments around water. Key areas for implementation and innovation include: identifying process and product innovations and investing in water-related environmental services.
Identify process and product innovations
Process and product innovations can be grouped into the following categories:
a. Decrease water use and impacts
b. Increase water recycling and reuse
c. Manage priority supply chain issues
d. Design of "water-savvy" products
Decrease Water Use and Impacts
For many companies, a logical first step to implementing a corporate water strategy involves minimizing the range of impacts in their water footprint by conserving and recycling water as well as managing water quality by reducing wastewater discharges and pretreating discharged water. Typically, a water strategy starts with management programs focused on internal operations, which can eventually be broadened across a company’s value chain. Companies also have an opportunity to identify supply inputs that may be water-intensive or detrimental to water quality.
Cost-effective water conservation and efficiency measures can pay for themselves in the form of reduced utility and energy bills. These financial savings are often the most obvious reason to justify the many changes required to conserve water, but there are additional intangible benefits to making water-wise changes:
• High visibility -- Such measures demonstrate an organization's commitment to using water responsibly, which can boost an organization’s public image.
• Ease of implementation -- Water efficiency measures can be quickly enacted, and are a good way to demonstrate that a company is serious about conserving a scarce environmental resource.
• Employee and public goodwill -- Implementing water efficiency measures suggested by employees and local interests generates goodwill and positive relations with the communities where organizations do business.
There are various ways to "slice" a company's approach to increasing water efficiency and reuse. One useful categorization is the following:
• Hardware Solutions: Monitor all water use; replace high-flow fixtures with water-efficient versions; replace water-intensive processes.
• Operational Solutions: Implement regular water "audit" programs; find alternatives to using water for operational tasks; institute a regular leak inspection and repair program; find ways to recirculate and use water multiple times; set and report on targets.
• Employee Solutions: Educate and encourage employees to conserve water and report leaks.
Using this categorization, a number of relatively simple, low-cost actions can be combined to create significant water conservation results, as laid out in the table of examples at the end of this article.
Production and manufacturing processes often provide opportunities for improvements in areas that use the most "expensive" water (water that requires pre-use treatment, heating or cooling and predisposal treatment). Such investments may include replacing outdated equipment, making modifications to existing equipment, establishing more-efficient operational procedures, and exploring new processes and procedures that use significantly less water without negatively affecting production and/or service quality.
Water efficiency measures within production processes also frequently result in energy savings. With rising water and sewer rates, as well as increasing prices for the energy required to heat water for many industrial processes, facility managers can reduce both operating costs and environmental impacts through an energy-efficiency program that includes a focus on water management.
An often overlooked area is buildings. In the U.S., buildings account for 12% of potable water consumption. According to the American Institute for Architecture, incorporating water efficiency methods in commercial buildings can cost effectively reduce water usage by 30% or more, a conclusion supported by a comprehensive assessment of urban water efficiency potential in California. Water use may also be high in outdoor areas, including water used for landscaping. Because this water use is often ornamental, or not critical for production, the potential for savings is significant. Advancements in landscape design and maintenance technologies have made the upkeep of healthy, efficient landscapes both simple and cost effective, so today's facility managers have many choices as to how to meet both landscaping needs and water reduction goals.
Increase Water Recycling/Reuse
Businesses can also engage in proactive measures for managing water quality through providing adequate wastewater collection, treatment and disposal, and by monitoring activities that might create water quality problems. The reuse of wastewater has an important role to play in managing water resources, particularly in reducing the potential impacts of the discharge of pollutants into water sources and reducing the demand on supplies of potable water. Operations that are adjacent to, and/or drain into natural waterways -- marine environments, wetlands, rivers, creeks and other fish habitats -- can reuse water in order to reduce impacts on the surrounding environment.
Recycling water involves using water previously employed for one purpose in another application before it reaches a natural waterway or aquifer. By using water several times, industries can increase the productivity of each gallon of water consumed and minimize the pollution of stormwater.
In general, process optimization means more than just investing in new equipment and technology. A facility manager's task is to develop a comprehensive, cost-effective design and operating program that optimizes water usage, recycling and discharge during production processes. Such programs generally focus on process water reuse and recycling in conjunction with improving the efficiency of production processes. These programs will differ among industries, as opportunities for water savings and pollution reduction are highly industry specific.
This summary was drawn from chapter IV of a longer report by Business for Social Responsibility and the Pacific Institute.
To read the entire report, click here.
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