An Indicator Framework Approach on Manufacturing Water Assessment towards Sustainable Water Demand Management

Journal of Environmental Treatment Techniques

2020, Volume 8, Issue 3, Pages: 875-883

J. Environ. Treat. Tech.

ISSN: 2309-1185

Journal web link: http://www.jett.dormaj.com

An Indicator Framework Approach on

Manufacturing Water Assessment towards

Sustainable Water Demand Management

Nurul Sa’dah Bahar , Zainura Zainon Noor , Azmi Aris¹^,², Nurul Ashikeen Binti

1,3*

Kamaruzaman⁴

Faculty of Engineering, School of Civil Engineering, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, 81310 Skudai, Johor Bahru, Malaysia

Centre of Environmental Sustainability and Water Security, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, 81310 Skudai, Johor Bahru, Malaysia

Faculty of Engineering, School of Chemical and Energy Engineering, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, 81310 Skudai, Johor Bahru, Malaysia

National Water Services Commission (SPAN), Cyberjaya, 63000, Selangor, Malaysia

Received: 02/01/2020

Accepted: 19/05/2020

Published: 20/09/2020

Abstract

Population growth, industrialization, urbanization and change of life style have increased global water demand. Although agricultural

water demand accounts as the largest overall user, emerging economics causes industrial and domestic water demand to increase

tremendously especially in developing countries. One sector that contributes to rapid industrial demand is manufacturing sector. Despite

many assessment methods being used in the past, it has been seen that measurement of manufacturing water use performance could only

be done for specific manufacturing factory or specific industries. Due to lack of a holistic framework towards assessment water

performance in any given manufacturing factory, this paper introduces an indicator-framework called Malaysia Manufacturing Industry

Water Benchmarking System (MIWABS). This indicator framework was developed based on relevant sets of indicators arranged under

sustainability pillars criteria. MIWABS uses stakeholder-driven approach whereby the established indicators and Analytic Hierarchy

Process (AHP) assigning weightage were done through workshops and questionnaires. Rubber glove and semiconductor industries were

chosen as demonstration study to validate the indicator-framework. The results highlighted the importance to emphasize on recycling

water in manufacturing facilities. Besides that, manufacturing factories shall also explore other water alternatives such as groundwater

and river to cater for their factory and production needs to reduce the dependency of potable water by public water operator. It is hoped

that MIWABS can give input and policy direction as part of water demand management strategies in Malaysia.

Keywords: Manufacturing water use, Water demand management, Indicator-framework, Sustainability

drinking and sanitation (3). Industrialization does play an

important role in boosting development in economy (4). In low-

and middle-income countries, industrial water demand is about

Introduction¹

.1 Background

Nowadays, sustainable water resource management is an

0%, however, this percentage is significantly different for high

overall concern in the world. With increasing population and

urbanization expansion, the world will face a severe global

water deficit (1) if water demand continues to rise with the

finite water supply. Unavoidably, population increase will have

direct impact to meet the demand in all sectors including

domestic, agricultural and industrial sector (2). Growing water

demand of 55% is projected by 2050. Among all sectors, an

increase of 400% for manufacturing water demand is expected

from 2000 to 2050. Multiple approaches have been used in

assessing manufacturing water use. In those separate studies,

indicators such as water per product, recycling rate and

wastewater generation had been evaluated for optimization.

These indicators are arranged according to sustainability pillar

criteria as shown in Table 1.

GDP countries where industrial water takes up about 60% of

the total water demand. Therefore, since water resources are

shared among sectors, assessment of water use in

manufacturing sector is important. For example in China,

economic transformation tremendously has changed the water

demand proportion (5). The shift of water demand causes more

initiatives to be introduced such as the Three Red Lines to

control water use (6). All previous research had been carried

out to optimize and minimize water use in primary activities

such as process water and cooling water. Besides that, they also

investigated minimization of wastewater generation that can be

harmful to the environment. These approaches used indicators

or drivers that reflect the current condition and helped to

monitor for future trend as well. However, these indicators have

yet to be presented in a holistic way to assess the performance

of manufacturing water use. Thus, this paper aims to introduce

the development of indicator-framework for manufacturing

Focusing within a manufacturing facility, common water

use is for the manufacturing process such as fabricating,

cleaning, cooling, transporting a product, embedded as final

product, cooling system, water treatment plant and also for

Corresponding author: Zainura Zainon Noor, (a) Faculty of Engineering, School of Civil Engineering, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia,

1310 Skudai, Johor Bahru, Malaysia and (b) Faculty of Engineering, School of Chemical and Energy Engineering, Universiti Teknologi

Malaysia, 81310 Skudai, Johor Bahru, Malaysia. Email: zainurazn@utm.my.

Journal of Environmental Treatment Techniques

2020, Volume 8, Issue 3, Pages: 875-883

water use called, Malaysia Manufacturing Industry Water

Benchmarking System (MIWABS). This indicator framework

has been developed through collaboration between Universiti

Teknologi Malaysia (UTM) and National Water Service

Commission (SPAN).

made based on some standardized manner. Selection of

indicators shall be done according to these criteria (35):

relevant, quantifiable, accessible, timely manner, and long term

oriented.

The measurement of indices is made from time to time that

allows tracking of trends and improvement. Changes of the

multidisciplinary indicators can also be made based on

applicability during time of measurements. Understanding

these trends allow stakeholders to make concise decision for

future betterment. Table 2 shows the example of developed

indicator framework in water resources management. Indicator

framework has been utilized to assess urban water, river basin,

region and country water demand. Juwana et al. (2016) had

developed WJWSI for river basin in Indonesia. Result for

WJWSI gives comparison for the catchments used as a starting

point by water authorities to embark on direction of water

demand management of the said area. Water Poverty Index on

the other hand, indicates water situation based on

multidisciplinary indicators including physical and

socioeconomics aspects.

The index allows countries and communities to be ranked

and it also enables the national and international organisations

to take necessary action on the resources available.

Furthermore, the impact towards the resources and its use can

be assessed by both organisations based on the socio-economic

factors. Studies have shown that indicator framework can

produce a conclusive assessment to deliver overall current and

performance improvement.

Table 1: Indicators for manufacturing water use in previous

researches

Sustainability Indicators

Aspect

Reference

Economic

Manufacturing gross value (7–11)

added

GDP / freshwater use

Shadow price of freshwater

Shadow price of wastewater

GDP per capita

Payback period

Water treatment cost

Environment Recycled water ratio

Water use per unit output

Water recirculation rate

Total water intake

(9,10,12–

32)

Savings in water consumption

Specific water-cooling demand

per product

Process water consumption

Groundwater withdrawal

Water depletion

3 Research Flow

Embodied water in coal use

embodied water in oil use

embodied water in other use

BOD5

The development of MIWABS consists of six (6) steps as

shown in Figure 1. As the scope was defined, the aspect of

research was identified. Horizon scanning of possible

indicators was carried out. Then, these indicators were screened

and filtered through workshop attended by relevant

stakeholders. After that, based on established aspects and

indicators, data collection took place in order to demonstrate

the indicator-framework. Next, normalization of data was done

where Proximity-to-Target method was used. Weightage

assignment was carried out by using AHP method and

questionnaire was distributed to water experts in Malaysia.

Lastly, the aggregation of MIWABS indicators was done to

express the performance of manufacturing factories in term of

score.

COD

Total dissolved solids (TDS)

Suspended Solid

Total nitrogen

Dissolved Oxygen

Total phosphorus

Total iron

Reduction

generation

Temperature

wastewater

•

Stage one — Horizon scanning: The criteria for the

Social

Training

Inefficiency level of execution

of ISO 14000

(18,20,33)

sustainable indicators relevant to manufacturing water demand

was based on sustainability concepts which are environmental,

economic, technological, and societal. These are the common

aspects when it comes to sustainability. In order to establish the

indicators, horizon scanning of existing indicators with respect

to manufacturing water demand was done. Along with the

criteria set, sustainable indicators must be measurable and

relevant to be applied generically in all manufacturing

industries in Malaysia.

Section 2 will explain on the concept of indicator-

framework and examples of indicator-framework that had been

developed in water resources management previously. Then, in

Section 3, the detail methodology for the development of

MIWABS will be explained. Section 4 shows the discussion of

the results. Conclusion and recommendation for future work

are then portrayed in Section 5 and Section 6, respectively.

The Concept of Indicator-Framework

One of the established methods to assess the performance

of water use is by using indicator-framework. It consists of

indicators, aspect and indices (34). An index which is a single

score number is obtained when aggregation of indicators is

Figure 1: Research flow for development of MIWABS

Journal of Environmental Treatment Techniques

2020, Volume 8, Issue 3, Pages: 875-883

Table 2: Indicator-framework in water demand management

Number of

Scope

Author

Indicator Framework

Aspect

indicators



Time taken to collect domestic

water



Clean sanitation

Water Availability

Access to safe water

(37)

Water Poverty Index (WPI)

Region or country



Life

Environment

Hydrology

Policy

Resource

Ecosystem Health

Infrastructure

Human Health and Well Being

Community Capacity

Resiliency

Quality

Efficiency

Conservation

Water use

Policy and Governance

(

38)

39)

Watershed Sustainability Index (WSI)

Canadian Water Sustainability Index

River Basin

Canada

(

(CWSI)

Sustainable Cities Water Index

SCWI)

50 Cities in the

world

(

40)

36)

(

West Java Water Sustainability Index

WJWSI)

(

River Basin

(

•

Stage two — Stakeholders’ perception for filtration of

assign weightage. This method is widely used in the world to

support individual and group decision making. Basically, the

method uses problem modelling, weights valuation, weights

aggregation and sensitivity analysis to rank the aspects (41).

The AHP questionnaire was designed and distributed to water

experts in Malaysia.

indicators: Based on the possible indicators gathered from the

horizon scanning process, filtration of indicators had been

carried out through a working session with water and

manufacturing stakeholders. Stakeholders consist of

representatives from SPAN, water operators, government

agencies, private agencies, and manufacturing factories.

Thorough discussion among the stakeholders had managed to

identify and establish the sets of indicators that was utilised for

MIWABS.

Horizon Scanning

Aggregation

•

Stage three — Data collection through questionnaires

for manufacturing factories: Based on the established

sustainable indicators, a questionnaire was developed and

distributed to selected manufacturing industries. As a pilot

study, scoping for water intensive manufacturing industry was

based on manufacturing census 2015 that was carried out by the

Department of Statistics Malaysia. Two manufacturing sectors

had been selected for the development of MIWABS namely

rubber glove and semiconductor manufacturing factories.

Weightage

Indicator Filtration

Data Collection

Assignment

Normalization of

Indicators

•

Stage four — Normalization of indicators: The

meas