Water is used in many stages of the industrial production process. From maintaining facilities, to conducting manufacturing processes, and even to grow elements used to make products. When you look at an industrial product, the water usage is typically hidden – you’re not thinking of the water used to make your car, for example, because the end product doesn’t have visible water.
Nationally, industrial water uses account for 15.9 billion gallons of daily water withdrawals–approximately four percent of the total across all usage categories. According to the U.S. Geological Survey, between 1.501 and 2.21 billion gallons of water were withdrawn for industrial use each day in Indiana, as of 2010. Fourteen percent of water used was from private well systems operated by the manufacturer.
Take a look to see just how much water goes into making the products we use every day.
Cars
To make the average passenger car, around 39,090 gallons of water are required. To make a single tire, an average of 518 gallons of water are used.
Clothing
To create a pair of blue jeans, about 1,800 gallons of water are needed just to grow enough cotton for one pair. To grow enough cotton to create one t-shirt, 400 gallons of water are consumed. These totals are just for growing the cotton – creating cotton fabric, constructing the clothing, and other factors are not accounted for, but do add to the water footprint to each clothing item.
It takes about 2,257 gallons of water to make one pair of shoes. To make a pound of synthetic rubber, used for shoe soles, 55 gallons of water are needed.
Construction Materials
One board of lumber takes about 5.4 gallons of water to grow – not included is water consumed during logging, cutting, and processing. A 2,400-square foot home requires approximately 30,000 square feet of lumber and other wood products.
To make one gallon of paint, it takes 13 gallons of water.
A ton of steel requires 62,000 gallons of water.
A ton of cement consumes 1,360 gallons of water.
A Latte
The average latte takes 53 gallons of water to create. This does not account for producing the to-go cups and lids for your drink.
Beer
A barrel of beer is 32 gallons of beverage. To create one barrel, it takes approximately 1,500 gallons of water.
Bottled Water
The bottle of water you’re drinking – it takes 1.85 gallons of water just to make the bottle! To produce a single liter of bottled water, it takes 1.39 liters of water.
Indiana American Water is committed to meeting the needs of all of its customer, including those who make the products we use in our everyday life. We annually invest more than $70 million in our water and wastewater systems around the state, including an investment of more than $57 million in our distribution system infrastructure in 2016.
