New guide counts the cost of water in dairies
A new benchmarking guide developed by Envirowise and Dairy UK Dairies could help dairies cut costs and achieve a reduction in water use and effluent generation of up to 50%.
Around 40 sites submitted data for Benchmarking water use in dairies. “Companies are often unaware of the true cost of water, which may be more than three times the total amount charged for supply and disposal - amounting to 1% of turnover,” said Dairy UK. “Water scarcity is also now a very real problem in the UK and the costs of using water are increasing all the time.”
The guide is designed to help dairy staff who carry out water audits and are involved with managing water use. It provides simple benchmarks for water use and effluent load discharged for three dairy sectors: fresh liquid milk, butter and cheese, and other products.
”Dairies that adopt a systematic approach to reducing water use and effluent generation can save money and increase profits without having to raise prices. Typical savings are in the region of a 20-50% reduction in water use and effluent generation,” said Dairy UK. “For a dairy operating with a profit margin of 5% making water savings could increase profits by 10%.”
The guide can be used to help liquid milk processors meet The Dairy Supply Chain Forum’s Sustainable Consumption and Production Taskforce’s Milk Roadmap targets for reducing their products’ environmental footprint.
Within the liquid milk sector, the benchmarking initiative revealed that the best-performing site had water use per unit of product of approximately 0.5l water used per litre of milk produced and the average ratio was 1.3l water used per litre of milk produced. To reduce the water consumption ratio from 1.3 to 0.5 throughout the industry would save approximately 5.6bnl of water per year, claimed Taskforce.
Dairy UK now plans to build on the success of this initiative and work with Envirowise to launch a comprehensive environmental benchmarking tool for the industry in the new year. This will address a much broader range of environmental criteria and will help the industry reduce its environmental footprint further, saving money and leading to a more sustainable industry for thefuture.
Benchmarking water use in dairies is available online at http://www.dairyuk.org.
