Abstract

DUEK, Alicia Elena  and  FASCIOLO, Graciela Elena. Industrial Water Use in Mendoza, Argentina: Coefficients for the Food Industry. Tecnol. cienc. agua [online]. 2014, vol.5, n.3, pp.51-62. ISSN 2007-2422.

Approximately 50% of the industries in the province of Mendoza, Argentina are related to food and drinks. In arid regions such as this one, the consumption and efficient use of water requires special attention by all demand sectors, including domestic, irrigation, industrial and environmental. The industries in Mendoza mostly use groundwater, including for cooling, as a prime material or for cleaning during different parts of the productive process. In this latter case, returning it to the hydric system. Knowledge about the water volume used by these industries is important for diverse applications, such as calculating virtual water products and obtaining water balances that incorporate the uses by sector at the basin level. To identify the water consumed by the food industry in Mendoza, the present work proposed using coefficients relating water volume with the prime material processed or the produced product. These can be applied to perform estimates per basin of the volume of water used by these industries. The main coefficients were obtained based on in-person interviews in industries with different production scales, such as warehouses, producers of beer and non-alcoholic drinks and fruit and vegetable preservers. In addition, the use of the water in the process is explained for each branch of activity. The coefficient values obtained from the interviews were compared with those reported by the local and international literature.

Keywords : Water uses; food industries; coefficients; Mendoza.

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