Media Release

Water Footprints Are Big

ROTORUA. 26 September 2012. Water footprints seem to be taking over from carbon footprints at the Water New Zealand Conference in Rotorua today.

While the production of a cup of coffee consumes a startling 140 litres of water, a pair of leather shoes consumes 8,000, the production of a single litre of bio-ethanol can consume between 1,200 and 3,000 litres of water, Professor Torkil Jonch Clausen, Chair Programme Committee, World Water Week in Stockholm and Adviser to Sweden’s Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment told the Water New Zealand conference in Rotorua this morning.

Water footprints

His message to the conference was that water is an increasingly scarce world resource and those countries who are blessed with abundant supplies of water, like New Zealand, are very fortunate.

ENDS