Water scarcity is an increasingly significant issue in many regions of the world, including the U.S., and our reduction efforts are ahead of the curve.
Dramatic Reduction in Water Usage
Water conservation is an important part of our holistic approach to reducing the environmental impact of our manufacturing operations.
From 2000 to 2006, our global manufacturing operations reduced water consumption by 25 percent, or approximately 6.8 billion gallons—roughly the same amount of water used by 68,000 U.S. households annually. This year, our U.S. plants are on pace to achieve another 10 percent reduction year over year.
Our water conservation initiatives cover all types of water usage, including that from municipal supply water, groundwater and surface water.
New Tools to Manage Water
Many factors have contributed to our reductions in water usage. Among them are two patent-pending tools developed by Ford engineers:
- The Water Estimation Tool (WET) is a software program that creates a facility-wide water balance to quantify individual uses of water and identify areas of opportunity.
- Engineers paired WET with another tool called “Water Ideas to Lessen Demand” (WILD), which lists more than 190 practical, proven techniques for reducing water usage. WILD helps each manufacturing operation first identify water usage patterns at individual unit operations, compare that usage to typical values and then determine the most cost-effective method to reduce consumption.
Continued Leadership
We were the first automotive manufacturer to certify all our manufacturing plants globally to ISO 14001 and our water-use reduction efforts continue this record of exceptional environmental achievement.