The Coca-Cola Company has missed a goal to return to the environment all water used in its manufacturing process, but is on track to improve its water use ratio 20 percent by 2012.
The company’s seventh sustainability report (pdf) says Coca-Cola missed a goal of, by 2010, returning all water used in its manufacturing process to the environment at a level that supports aquatic life.
In 2009, Coca-Cola released 179 billion liters of treated wastewater back to the environment, and 89 percent of its facilities—representing 95 percent of product volume—were compliant with its internal wastewater treatment standards.
The report does not have final data for 2010, but Coca-Cola said it estimates that 94 percent of facilities would have been compliant by the end of 2010, with work underway to make remaining plants compliant by the end of this year.
“Significant challenges have had an impact on our system achieving 100 percent compliance,” the report said, but did not elaborate on what those challenges were.
Coca-Cola has launched a system-wide water resource standard, requiring each of its more than 900 bottling plants to develop a source water protection plan by 2013.
The company says that it intends to attain a 2020 goal of replenishing all water used in its finished beverages.
Its initial estimates indicate that the equivalent of 22 percent of water used in its drinks was replenished through projects completed or ongoing in 2009.
The report also says that in 2009 Coca-Cola achieved its seventh consecutive year of improving water-use efficiency, with a water use ratio of 2.36 liters of water per liter of product produced – a 2.9 percent improvement from 2009.
This represents a 13 percent reduction since 2004, putting the company on track to meet its goal of improving the water ratio by 20 percent by 2012, compared to a 2004 baseline.
Other highlights of the report:
A summary of the company's fifth sustainability report can be found here.