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Chemical Technology • May 2015
RENEWABLES
planted along river banks to stabilise the soil and prevent run-
off of pesticides and pollutants. A water pump now irrigates
closer to the ground and at lower pressure. The result is a
saving of over 1 700 cubic metres of water annually.
Coca Cola and Pepsi are both working to reduce their
water use in beverage manufacturing. By comparison, Coca
Cola uses only 1,3 litres of water per litre of beverage, but
their volumes are significant. They are promising to reduce
that to 1,2 litres per litre.
Agriculture, though, is where water savings really need to
bemade. Research and product development has focused on
two dimensions: more focused water use and efficiency in its
management and distribution; and in genetically modifying
crops to require less water in the first place.
John Deere has a range of precision irrigation systems.
These, also known as drip irrigation, ensure that water is
not randomly sprayed but delivered directly to plant roots.
This minimises evaporation and over-watering, the two main
culprits in inefficiency. Drip irrigation is mainly used by large-
scale farmers because of the need for electronic control
systems, pumps, valves and the various accoutrements of
a processing plant. John Deere acquired Roberts Irrigation,
which focuses on much smaller scale agriculture, including
greenhouses, and at much lower cost.
Another area of highwater use is in humanwaste disposal.
Toilets themselves can use up to 15 litres of water with every
flush, and processing of the sewage uses considerably more.
GE is presently developing large mobile water-treatment
plants for use in the Middle East which can return waste-
water for human consumption or, in the most arid regions,
desalination versions can produce large quantities of fresh
water from the ocean.
The Bill andMelinda Gates Foundation “Reinvent the toilet
challenge” is a project aimed at developing new treatment
processes and more efficient ‘loos’. A recent demonstration
of the system even used the biomass recovered from the
process to power the treatment plant.
Efficiency, in other words, doesn’t just cater to environmen-
tal concerns, it is also very good for business effectiveness
and profitability.
Genetic modification is also not only about staple crops.
Ribena, a popular British drink made from blackcurrants,
is threatened by the mild winters and warm summers in
the UK. Blackcurrants have been grown in the UK since the
1800s, but, in some areas of the country such as Kent and
Somerset, two varieties of blackcurrants – Baldwin and Ben
Lomond – are suffering from increasingly poor yields.
GSK is working with The Scottish Crop Research Institute’s