Move over carbon, water footprinting is the next big thing.

What is a water footprint? According to the Water Footprint Network, it is “an indicator of water use that looks at both direct and indirect water use of a consumer or producer. The water footprint of an individual, community or business is defined as the total volume of freshwater that is used to produce the goods and services consumed by the individual or community or produced by the business. Water use is measured in terms of water volumes consumed (evaporated) and/or polluted per unit of time. A water footprint can be calculated for any well-defined group of consumers (e.g. an individual, family, village, city, province, state or nation) or producers (e.g. a public organization, private enterprise or economic sector). The water footprint is a geographically explicit indicator, not only showing volumes of water use and pollution, but also the locations.”

In August, SABMiller and WWF issued a report (“Water Footprinting: Identifying & Addressing Water Risks in the Value Chain”) that provides a good overview of water-related business risks. The report also presents a case study of SABMiller’s water footprint results for its beer operations in South Africa and the Czech Republic. Not surprising, crop production was the largest contributor, averaging over 90 percent of the footprint. But the South African water footprint was significantly greater than the Czech Republic footprint, due to “the differing country temperature (evapo-transpiration) profiles, greater reliance on irrigated crops in South Africa and the larger proportion of imported agricultural raw materials flowing into SAB Ltd, SABMiller’s South African business, from countries where crop water consumption is higher.”

Value Chain Approach to Water Footprinting (Source: "Water Footprinting: Identifying & Addressing Water Risks in the Value Chain," SABMiller and WWF; click to enlarge)

SABMiller has set a target of reducing its operational water use per litre of beer by 25 percent by 2015.  This will bring the company’s water consumption to an average of 3.5 litres of water to make a litre of beer, down from 4.6 litres in 2008.

I recommend you read the report for all the details.  But here are my two key takeaways:

• Water is different than carbon.  It’s tangible, whereas carbon is not. Water impacts our daily lives: we drink it, bathe in it, fish in it, cook with it, etc. But an estimated 1.2 billion people in the world lack access to clean water. Mess with scarce water supplies, and you’ll get a strong response from people. Just ask Coca-Cola. Farmers in the Indian state of Rajasthsan have accused the company of using too much of the area’s water supplies and contributing to pollution (see video from PBS broadcast).
• Water footprinting suffers from the same constraints as carbon footprinting: a lack of measurement standards.  As stated in the SABMiller report, “There is also significant complexity in calculating the impact of one water footprint versus another on the environment and on communities. Therefore, whilst good for consumer awareness, water footprints are not yet effective tools for helping consumers choose between different products. Over time, and as methodologies mature and become more standardized, this may change. For now, the numbers are helping businesses and other water users to understand more fully how best to operate within the context of the water environment.”

Water footprinting is actually not that new. WWF started working on this back in 2006, and many companies have been looking at this issue for some time. But water footprinting hasn’t gathered as much publicity as carbon footprinting. In my opinion, water deserves as much attention as carbon, if not more. What do you think?