Determination of water footprint of Bursa province

Water is the most important and invaluable environmental resource because it is an important factor for the continuation of life due to the need of living organisms to survive. Therefore, many scientists and researchers have studied this subject and how to reduce water waste with the increase in global warming, the lack of rain and the increase in the population. The proposed water footprint as an indicator for assessing the allocation of freshwater resources to a producer or consumer from a virtual water perspective and it takes in to account direct and indirect water consumption and helps in managing water resources. Within this context, the WF of Bursa province, is the fifth most economically developed city in Turkey and the fifth largest city in Turkey in terms of population, was calculated. Its total surface area is 11.027 square kilometers. The total population of the province in 2021 is 3 million and 56 thousand people. In the calculations, domestic, agricultural and industrial water footprints were assessed separately, and blue and green water footprints were analyzed in detail. According to the results, the average WF of Bursa province was found 105,417 billion m3 / year. Throughout the province, 77 % of the WF is composed of WF Industrial, 21 % is WF domestic and 2 % is WF agricultural. The average per capita water footprint of Bursa province was found to be 7220 m3/ year/ /capita. The total water footprint of the industrial sector has been calculated as 80.952 billion m3. If we look at the reason for this, in addition to the presence of many industries in the province of Bursa, there are large amounts of industrial pollutants in industrial wastewater that needs a large amount of fresh water to dilute. The amount of industrial gray water footprint in Bursa has been calculated as 80,822 billion m3. Total domestic water footprint is calculated as 22,064 billion m3. Gray water footprint was determined as the majority of the domestic water footprint 75%. Direct and indirect water footprints account for 24 % and 1 % of the total domestic water footprint, respectively. Due to the continuous industrialization and urbanization in the study area and the increase in population, it is important to reduce the use of blue water in agriculture, domestic and industrial sectors, to carry out studies on the use of green water and to raise awareness on this issue.