Through WateReuse Association, Claudia Llerandi, PE contributes to a collaborative paper on advancing water reuse within the beverage industry.
Kennedy Jenks (KJ) announces their contributions and support of the recently published paper, “Advancing Water Reuse Within the Beverage Industry.” The paper, part of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (USEPA) National Water Reuse Action Plan (WRAP), is the result of collaboration among federal and local regulators, major international beverage manufacturers, consulting engineers, and non-profits explores solutions to advance water reuse specifically at beverage manufacturing plants. Claudia Llerandi, PE, a Principal Engineer at KJ, served as a technical reviewer on the document on behalf of the WateReuse Association.
The WRAP is aimed at accelerating how quickly water recycling is adopted in key sectors of our economy, including the beverage industry. The paper makes a clear case that there are many opportunities – near-, mid- and long-term – for beverage manufacturers to implement water recycling strategies at their facilities that would have a significant impact on the overall operations and helping them meet their sustainability of goals.
Beverage manufacturing plants are often located in geographic regions that are challenged by the constraints of water scarcity, droughts, and overall limits on water resources. As the beverage industry continues to grow, opportunities for advancing water reuse do, too. Increasing the water reuse on site not only has positive impacts on the amount of water used for beverage production, allowing for a more sustainable business model, but also improves the local environment and economy.
The water used for beverage manufacturing is usually treated both coming into the facility (with reverse osmosis systems) as high levels of purity are needed for consistency in flavor and quality, and before exiting the facility, as industrial wastewater typically needs pH adjustment and treatment to remove high concentrations of dissolved solids and biological oxygen demand (BOD), before being able to discharge to a downstream wastewater treatment plant.
It’s eye-opening when we look at how much water is required to produce popular beverages. Three to six gallons of wastewater may be produced just to produce one gallon of wine. KJ has a wealth of experience in the food and beverage industry, including in industrial treatment of wastewater at wineries and other beverage production facilities.
The paper efforts were led by GHD, in collaboration with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Antea Group, Beverage Industry Environmental Roundtable (BIER), Idaho Department of Environmental Quality, PepsiCo, Inc., the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, San Francisco Public Utilities Commission, the Water Environment Federation – Industrial Water Community, and the WateReuse Association.
The paper is available through the WateReuse Association and GHD’s website.
About Kennedy Jenks
Kennedy Jenks is a leading water and environmental engineering and environmental sciences firm that serves public agencies and private-sector clients with over 475 employees nationwide. The employee-owned firm delivers innovative design, construction, and technology solutions for water and environmental projects across the United States.
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