Water Footprint of the Water Cycle of Gran Canaria and Tenerife (Canary Islands, Spain)
Abstract
:1. Introduction
- Eastern Islands: this group of islands (Gran Canaria, Fuerteventura, and Lanzarote) lacks the same availability of groundwater resources as the western islands. This is why desalination has played an important role on these islands since the 1970s, especially on Fuerteventura and Lanzarote [14]. On the island of Gran Canaria, surface water resources are important, and the island has 75 large dams [15], although the exploitation of underground water resources, with wells and water galleries, is also relevant [16].
- Western islands: these islands (Tenerife, La Palma, La Gomera, and El Hierro) are rich in groundwater; approximately 80% of the drinking water demand is covered through groundwater.
Study Area
2. Materials and Methods
- Water galleries: tunnels dug into the interior of the islands in search of the aquifer. These excavations have a certain inclination and, once the aquifer is reached, the water is extracted by gravity without the need for pumping [29].
- Wells: vertical boreholes of different diameters and depths that seek to reach the aquifer (mainly in coastal areas) to extract drinking water. It is very important to control the extraction flow rates in this type of infrastructure, to avoid saline intrusion and consequent deterioration of the quality of the water extracted [30].
- Desalination: consists of obtaining seawater and removing the chlorides from it to make it suitable for human consumption [22]. Generally, a reverse osmosis process is used, consisting of the installation of semi-permeable membranes that eliminate the ions and make the water drinkable.
- Wastewater treatment plants: a facility that collects the wastewater generated in a city or company and, through physicochemical processes, removes the physicochemical pollutants from it. In this way, the water can be run through a tertiary treatment that allows it to be reused, or it can be discharged into a watercourse following a procedure in accordance with the applicable legislation.
- Water wells and galleries: flow extracted from the aquifer by these facilities, facility-related water losses not returning to the system (after water abstraction), and reuse of water in any process.
- Distribution network: measuring the water flowing through the network, as well as the water losses along the system.
- Wastewater treatment plant: flow of water treated, most important pollutant(s) found in the water and concentration value(s), volume of drinking water used, destination of the treated effluent, reuse of water, and disposal of the sludge generated.
- Seawater desalination plant: flow obtained from the sea, flow of drinking water used in the facility, total desalinated flow, and reuse of water.
2.1. Blue Water
2.2. Grey Water
2.3. Green Water
3. Results and Discussion
4. Conclusions
Author Contributions
Funding
Institutional Review Board Statement
Informed Consent Statement
Data Availability Statement
Acknowledgments
Conflicts of Interest
References
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Island | Facility | Total Volume of Water Abstracted 2019 (m3/year) | Blue Water Footprint 2019 (m3/year) | Total Volume of Water Abstracted 2020 (m3/year) | Blue Water Footprint 2020 (m3/year) |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Tenerife | Water gallery | 83,000 | 1660 | 82,900 | 1658 |
Well | 294,970.08 | 4424.55 | 269,544 | 4043.16 | |
Desalination plant | 3,548,984 | 90,000 | 3,631,564 | 90.00 | |
Water treatment | - | 0.00 | - | 0.00 | |
Distribution | 130,935 | 26,187 | 132,022 | 26,404.4 | |
Desalination plant | 10,873,243 | 93.00 | 8,613,179 | 93.00 | |
Gran Canaria | Well 1 | 318,623 | 6372.46 | 299,099 | 5981.98 |
Well 2 | 4661 | 46.61 | 93.00 | 0.93 |
Island | Facility | Grey Water Footprint 2019 (m3/year) | Grey Water Footprint 2020 (m3/year) |
---|---|---|---|
Tenerife | Water gallery | 0.00 | 0.00 |
Well | 0.00 | 0.00 | |
Desalination plant | 0.00 | 0.00 | |
Water treatment | 79,062.22 | 108,346.67 | |
Distribution | 0.00 | 0.00 | |
Desalination plant | 0.00 | 0.00 | |
Gran Canaria | Well 1 | 0.00 | 0.00 |
Well 2 | 0.00 | 0.00 |
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Cruz-Pérez, N.; Santamarta, J.C.; García-Gil, A.; Rodríguez-Martín, J.; Miralles-Wilhelm, F.; Hernández-Alemán, A.; Aldaya, M.M. Water Footprint of the Water Cycle of Gran Canaria and Tenerife (Canary Islands, Spain). Water 2022, 14, 934. https://doi.org/10.3390/w14060934
Cruz-Pérez N, Santamarta JC, García-Gil A, Rodríguez-Martín J, Miralles-Wilhelm F, Hernández-Alemán A, Aldaya MM. Water Footprint of the Water Cycle of Gran Canaria and Tenerife (Canary Islands, Spain). Water. 2022; 14(6):934. https://doi.org/10.3390/w14060934
Chicago/Turabian StyleCruz-Pérez, Noelia, Juan C. Santamarta, Alejandro García-Gil, Jesica Rodríguez-Martín, Fernando Miralles-Wilhelm, Anastasia Hernández-Alemán, and Maite M. Aldaya. 2022. "Water Footprint of the Water Cycle of Gran Canaria and Tenerife (Canary Islands, Spain)" Water 14, no. 6: 934. https://doi.org/10.3390/w14060934
APA StyleCruz-Pérez, N., Santamarta, J. C., García-Gil, A., Rodríguez-Martín, J., Miralles-Wilhelm, F., Hernández-Alemán, A., & Aldaya, M. M. (2022). Water Footprint of the Water Cycle of Gran Canaria and Tenerife (Canary Islands, Spain). Water, 14(6), 934. https://doi.org/10.3390/w14060934