Abstract
Water Footprint (WF) is broadly applied as a method to quantify impacts associated with the water use throughout the value chain of products, nevertheless the need for a more temporally and spatially explicit evaluation has recently been highlighted. In this paper a region specific WF inventory and midpoint impact assessment for the cotton-textile value chain in Pakistan is introduced. The locally relevant parameters are identified and included into the water consumption inventory and water availability database. The results are applied to a numerical model for the cotton cultivation. For the water consumption, the introduced region specific parameters are position on the irrigation channel, water source (distinguishing between surface and groundwater), use of the storage reservoirs and water trade between farmers for the inventory. Parameters groundwater level, and salinity and distinguishing between surface and groundwater are included into the water availability database. The calculated WF demonstrates that the separate assessment of the surface and groundwater in both inventory and impact assessment is essential on a regional level. Evaluating local conditions play the vital role for a robust quantification of the WF. Further development of the region specific impact assessment is needed in particular for the endpoint impact assessment for the areas of protection human health, ecosystems and freshwater resources.
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Notes
- 1.
Here only the water scarcity footprint is described.
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Finogenova, N., Berger, M., Finkbeiner, M. (2019). Enhancing the Water Footprint Method to a Region Specific Management Tool. In: Schebek, L., Herrmann, C., Cerdas, F. (eds) Progress in Life Cycle Assessment. Sustainable Production, Life Cycle Engineering and Management. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-92237-9_4
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