What are leading corporations doing to reduce water use and address the impending water crisis? In the second panel of the day, green business leaders discuss water issues, moderated by John Davies, VP of GreenBiz Intelligence for Greener World Media.
Michael Kobori, VP of Supply Chain Social and Environmental Sustainability for Levi Strauss described the lifecycle assessment that Levi's has undergone to assess the water footprint of its core products. One pair of 501 jeans uses 3,480 liters of water (or about 920 gallons); 49% is used in cotton growing, 45% in home laundering and just 5% in milling and manufacturing, which Levi's directly controls. Kobori noted that while they control a small fraction of water use, the company is addressing the consumer portion of consumption. "We've changed the care label in the jeans to 'wash in cold water and tumble dry.'" And Levi's is working with Proctor and Gamble's coldwater Tide on in-store advertising in Wal-Mart stores which encourages consumer to wash less and use cold water.
Al Halvorsen, Director of Environmental Sustainability with Frito-Lay (part of PepsiCo) harped on his firm's efforts to reduce water use by 50% per pound of product starting with the creation of an internal corporate Department of Energy in 1999. "We are trying to take existing plants as far off the water grid as possible," Halvorsen noted, by filtering and recapturing water. They are also reaching out to suppliers and packers, requesting they commit to the same water reduction goals as Frito-Lay.
Meanwhile, Jason Morrison, Director of Economic Globalization and the Environment Program at the Pacific Institute drew applause with a realistic take: "You can't think about just the cost for business of water, you need to think more holistically about the implications." Morrison noted that an amazing number of Fortune 500 companies don't understand their full impact (present company not included). The Pacific Institute published a report with BSR (Business for Social Responsibility) offering a framework for understanding water issues.
Morrison closed the panel highlighting the need for education around water issues. While companies can't be expected to educate the public, they have the opportunity to. He described the CEO Mandate he is involved with, which was written 1 year ago, and encourages companies to address water as a strategic initiative. We'll need to align our use of water with the reality of the situation, bringing our lifestyles into balance with the availability of water, Morrison advised.
Is water the new carbon?
Nanosensors and real-time water quality monitoring is vital to improve OEE and reduce water waste in most industries, including beverage, food, energy, manufacturing, mining, water treatment, environment, security etc.
Organisms such as cyanobacteria, for instance, are activated in the spring season when the sun's rays get through the ice and the oxidation level is down in water bodies. Their levels of activity also depend on the amount of light. The problem is that certain cyanobacteria form CyanoHABs (harmful algal blooms) generate extremely potent toxins that have no known antidotes. Such situations have engendere the need for real-time water quality monitoring systems. Accurate electro-chemical methods are being employed to enable water disinfection effectiveness and lower chemical consumption through water.
Nanosensors are gaining opportunities in sensing applications owing to their benefits, such as faster performance, ability to design more compact systems, and so on. H2oAlliance partners have developed a water quality monitoring technology that can detect both organic and nonorganic contamination to as low as a few parts per million. The benefit is that this technology eliminates the need to use expensive lab-based testing techniques such as spectrophotometry or chromatography. These water quality monitoring systems provide customized detection using up to 19 nanosensors simultaneously to keep tabs on the chemistry of water, liquids, and slurries. The monitored data is then fed into a neural network that generates real-time analysis that operators can visualize. When the sensors come into contact with the target molecules, their electrical properties undergo changes, making them suitable for monitoring water chemistry.
Nanosensor monitoring and measurement units are capable of detecting a variety of ions, including nitrate, ammonium, fluro, chloride, sulfide, calcium, magnesium, manganese, natriumbicarbonate, ferrous, iron, aluminum, copper, barium, chromium, lead, arsenic, boron, cadmium, and so on. Salts, including hypochlorite, hydrogen peroxide, peracetic acid, ammonium bromide, Fe3+ salts, and Al-salts, can also be detected. Organisms such as microbial reducing bacteria and cyanobacteria along with toxic compounds such as hydrogen sulfide, arsenic, and cyanide compounds can be monitored.
The benefits of this technology include conservation of water, energy, raw materials, and chemicals during production along with instantaneous reporting of anomalies detected by the sensors. These nanosensor and water management platform solutions cater to the overall improvement of an industrial process by providing detection, monitoring, measuring, analysis, collection, refining, and delivery of real-time data on changes in water chemistry. An added benefit is that the sensors can be integrated within ICT (information and communication technology) systems that are part of the industry’s communications network in order to rapidly communicate changes--in water, liquid, and slurry used -- to people or other devices.
H2oAlliance's technology solutions are being applied across a range of industries. One of the main applications is real-time early detection and warning systems. The partners provide mobile units and platforms that are robust and require low maintenance. Owing to these properties, the technology is suited for harsh conditions that accompany the mining and minerals, and paper pulp industries.
For instance, the deployment of a real-time fluid monitoring technology in the pharmaceutical industry has helped in complying with the stringent regulatory and operating constraints. The core technology is adapted to serve this industry through its measurement system that provides water monitoring for pharmaceutical processes. Other applications where the nanosensor technology can be used include ground water and surface quality monitoring. In one instance it was found that decreasing bacteria activity in ground water caused a decrease in water quality and bottled water problems. Similarly, the technology can be used in tunnel water quality monitoring, flotation water quality monitoring, and so on. In the past decade, H2oAlliance partners have identified specific water supply and water quality management challenges in both developed and developing countries and have devised solutions to address the challenges in industrial processes.
More information: www.H2oAlliance.org, or contact Minna.LeVine@H2oAlliance.org, active participant at the CEO Water Mandate team.