U.S. Department of the Interior

U.S. Geological Survey

Fact Sheet 2008–3032 

April 2008

National Water Availability and Use Program

Consumptive Water Use in the Great Lakes Basin

Printed on recycled paper

Introduction

Great Lakes state agencies and organizations view 

understanding consumptive water use as a critical component 

in water-resource management. To assist them in developing a 

better understanding of the factors involved in consumptive use 

(table 1), the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) has completed an 

inventory of consumptive-use coefficients for the Great Lakes 

Basin. 

For the purposes of this report, the Great Lakes Basin 

(fig. 1) is delineated based on surface-water divides and 

includes states and provinces that are entirely or partially 

within the basin. Because the rate of consumptive use depends 

on how water is used, consumptive-use information for the 

Great Lakes Basin was compiled and statistically analyzed by 

water-use category (table 2; Shaffer and Runkle, 2007). For 

comparison, the statistics for the climatically similar areas 

(fig. 1) to the Great Lakes Basin are included (table 2). These 

climatically similar areas have comparable patterns of temperature and precipitation, percent consumptive loss, and water use to the Great Lakes 

Basin. Details about consumptive water-use 

data and consumptive-use coefficients are 

available in Shaffer and Runkle (2007). 

Computing Consumptive Use

Two common ways to estimate 

consumptive use are with a water-balance 

equation (that is, consumptive use = withdrawal (and deliveries from public suppliers) – return flow (and releases to sewers), 

fig. 2A) or by application of a consumptiveuse coefficient (fig. 2B). Measurements 

or well-documented estimates of delivery, 

withdrawal, return flow, and release data 

are needed to use a water-balance equation. Consumptive-use coefficients are 

calculated by dividing the amount of water 

removed from the environment and not 

returned (consumptive use) by the total 

amount of water withdrawn. Consumptiveuse coefficients are commonly reported as a 

percentage. 

Consumptive water use is defined as water that is evaporated, 

transpired, incorporated into products or crops, consumed by 

humans or livestock, or otherwise removed from an immediate 

water environment.

Consumptive Use by Water-Use Category and 

Geographic Area

Water-use categories used to compile and organize 

consumptive-use coefficients are listed and defined in table 1. 

The summary statistics listed in table 2 show the considerable 

variability in consumptive-use coefficients by category due to 

the different water-use processes involved. The summary statistics in table 2 include 

•	 the median—the value for which 50 percent of the values are 

higher and 50 percent are lower,

•	 the 25th and 75th percentiles—which together bracket half of 

the values used in the statistical analysis, and

•	 N—the number of values used in the statistical analysis. 

The median consumptive-use coefficients for the Great 

Lakes Basin by water-use category are graphed in fig. 3. The 

coefficient statistics in table 2 are a starting point for estimating 

consumptive use and return flow (fig. 2). For example, the Great 

Lakes Basin median consumptive-use coefficients (table 2) were 

used to estimate the 2000 consumptive use for the Great Lakes 

States (table 3). The water withdrawals and estimated consumptive use for the Great Lakes states in 2000 are shown in figures 

4 and 5, respectively. 

Figure 1. The Great Lakes Basin, the Great Lakes States and Provinces, and states 

considered climatically similar.
Table 1. Water-use categories, their definitions, and consumptive-use characteristics.

Water-use category Definition Consumptive-use characteristics

Domestic Domestic water use is water that is used for household 

indoor and outdoor water purposes. Self-supplied 

domestic water use is water that is not obtained 

from a public-supply facility. Public-supplied domestic use is from a public-supply facility.

Domestic consumptive use (both self-supplied 

and publicly supplied) occurs primarily during 

outdoor watering of lawns and gardens, sidewalk and car washing, filling and maintaining 

pools, and to a lesser extent, during indoor 

cooking, cleaning, showering, and clothes 

washing (Marilee Horn, U.S. Geological Survey, written commun., February 2007). 

Public supply Public-supply water use is water withdrawn by private 

and public water suppliers and delivered to customers who, in turn, use the water for purposes such as 

domestic, commercial, thermoelectric power, industrial, and public water use (Solley and others, 1998). 

For details, see descriptions for other water-use 

categories. Public water consumptive use may 

be from evaporation and transpiration from 

firefighting, street washing, municipal parks 

maintenance and swimming pools.

Industrial Industrial water use is water used for industrial fabrication, washing, processing, and cooling. Industrial consumptive use may occur through 

product incorporation, evaporation from 

cooling and heating processes, cleaning, and 

groundskeeping.

Thermoelectric power Thermoelectric-power water use is water used in the 

process of generating electric power. 

Thermoelectric consumptive use is from evaporation 

during the condenser- and reactor-cooling process.

Irrigation Irrigation water use is the application of water on 

lands to assist in the growing of crops, pastures, 

or nurseries or to maintain vegetative growth in 

recreational lands. 

Irrigation consumptive use is from evapotranspiration (evaporation and transpiration from 

watering vegetation).

Livestock Livestock water use is water used for stock watering, 

feedlots, dairy operations, fish farming, and other 

on-farm needs. 

Livestock consumptive use occurs through processes such as stock watering and facility and 

animal cleaning.

Commercial Commercial water use is water used in restaurants, 

motels, hotels, office buildings, military and 

nonmilitary institutions, snow making, and other 

commercial facilities. 

Processes that contribute to commercial consumptive use are lawn and landscape watering, 

sidewalk and car washing, food preparation by 

restaurants, cooling towers for large air-conditioning units, fountains, aquariums and watertheme parks, laundromats, snow making, 

evaporation from offstream fish hatcheries, 

toilet use by customers, and whirlpools used in 

rehabilitation facilities and hospitals. 

Mining Mining water is the water withdrawn during the 

extraction of minerals. 

Mining consumptive use is water consumed during quarrying, milling, and other operations 

associated with mining activities.

Domestic and Public Supply

Statistics for the domestic and public-supply categories 

were similar; more than half of the domestic and public-supply 

consumptive-use coefficients were between 10 and 15 percent 

(25th and 75th percentiles were the same for the two categories). The domestic category had a median coefficient of 15 

percent, whereas the public-supply category had a median 

coefficient of 12 percent. The similarities in coefficients for 

domestic and public supply may be explained by the majority of 

deliveries from public suppliers going to domestic users.

Estimating public-supply consumptive use with a balancing equation (withdrawal minus return flow) most often is not 

feasible. The customer base and service areas for the water-supply withdrawals and wastewater discharges are usually different. 

Return flows may even exceed withdrawals in areas with (1) 

high water tables, because ground water can leak into sewers, or 

(2) combined storm and sanitary sewers, because runoff cannot 

be distinguished from return flows. 

Unaccounted-for water (public uses and conveyance 

losses) may be unknown or removed from the public-supply 

system before it is actually subject to consumptive-use processes. Because of this, many public-supply reports use the term 

“unaccounted-for water” and quote rates between 10 and 25 

percent of withdrawals.

The median consumptive-use coefficient for the Great 

Lakes Basin was 12 percent for the domestic and public-supply 

categories combined. Great Lakes States withdrawals for the 

public-supply category were 10,200 million gallons per day 

(Mgal/d), the second largest withdrawals in 2000 (table 3, fig. 

4); estimated consumptive use was 1,200 Mgal/d, the largest 

estimated consumptive use in the Great Lakes States. 
Table 2. Consumptive-use coefficient statistics for the Great Lakes Basin and climatically similar areas, by water-use 

category (from Shaffer and Runkle, 2007).

[Minimum (Min), median, maximum (Max), 25th percentile, and 75th percentile are in percent and rounded to the nearest whole number. N is the 

number of references in the statistical analysis. References are only from publications after 1975 (mining and commercial), 1980 (industrial, irrigation, 

thermoelectric, livestock), or 1985 (domestic and public supply).]

Geographical area

Summary statistics of consumptive-use coefficients,

by indicated water-use category 

Min 25th Median 75th Max N

Domestic and Public Supply 

Great Lakes Basin 0 10 12 15 74 161

Climatically similar areas 6 10 15 20 70 68

Industrial

Great Lakes Basin 0 7 10 14 35 122

Climatically similar areas 0 4 10 13 34 97

Thermoelectric

Great Lakes Basin 0 1 2 2 21 141

Climatically similar areas 0 0 2 4 75 75

Irrigation

Great Lakes Basin 70 90 90 96 100 95

Climatically similar areas 37 90 100 100 100 75

Livestock

Great Lakes Basin 01 80 83 90 100 85

Climatically similar areas 102 86 100 100 100 73

Commercial

Great Lakes Basin 4 8 10 15 26 29

Climatically similar areas 3 8 10 13 33 61

Mining

Great Lakes Basin 0 7 10 25 58 58

Climatically similar areas 0 10 14 20 86 83

1

 The livestock minimum coefficient (0 percent) is from Great Lakes Commission (2005) in which Minnesota reported 0.25 Mgal/d total 

withdrawn in 1998 and 0.0 Mgal/d consumptive use. The next lowest coefficient for the Great Lakes Basin was 66 percent. 

2

 The livestock minimum coefficient is from Solley and others (1988) and may be the result of their adding animal specialties, including fish 

farming, into the livestock water-use category. In previous and subsequent USGS reports, fish farming was in different water-use categories.

Figure 2. Computation of consumptive use by a single facility: A, using a water-balance equation; B, applying a 

consumptive-use coefficient (Mgal/d, million gallons per day).

Consumptive

use (?)

1.0 Mgal/d 

withdrawal

Consumptive use = Withdrawal – Return flow 

(0.1 Mgal/d) = (1.0 Mgal/d) – (0.9 Mgal/d)

Facility

0.9 Mgal/d 

return flow

Cooling

 tower 

A B

Consumptive

use (?)

1.0 Mgal/d 

withdrawal

Consumptive use = Withdrawal × Consumptive-use coefficient

(0.1 Mgal/d) = (1.0 Mgal/d) × (10/100)

Facility

Return flow (?)

Cooling

 tower 

Consumptive-use coefficient = 10 percent
Industrial

Literature on industrial consumptive-use coefficients describes 

either general industrial consumptive-use coefficients (based on a 

variety of industries) or coefficients for specific industrial groups 

defined by their standard industrial classification (SIC) code. Table 

2 lists the general industrial consumptive-use coefficient median 

for the Great Lakes Basin (10 percent), which compares closely 

with the 1983 Census of Manufactures consumptive-use coefficient 

for all manufacturing industries (11 percent) (U.S. Bureau of the 

Census, 1986; Shaffer and Runkle, 2007).

 In 1983, approximately 93 percent of the industrial water 

withdrawals for the U.S. part of the Great Lakes Basin were 

from six major SIC code groups (U.S. Bureau of the Census, 

1986). The medians for these six SIC-code groups are listed in 

table 4. 

Table 5 is a more detailed compilation of SIC-code industry 

groups with comparatively large consumptive-use coefficients 

(U.S. Bureau of the Census, 1986); specifically, industries with 

consumptive-use coefficients of 50 percent or more, and industries with consumptive-use coefficients of 20 percent or more and 

with withdrawals of more than 5.5 billion gallons in 1983. 

Since this major study in the 1980s, the bottled-water 

and ethanol-fuel industries have become and are still becoming much more noteworthy in terms of water withdrawal and 

consumptive use. The bottled-water industry has a high consumptive-use coefficient (97–100 percent), whereas the ethanolfuel industry currently (2008) has a median consumptive-use 

coefficient of 77 percent, excluding water used in irrigating 

the ethanol source crops. Recent references also indicate that 

consumptive-use coefficients for the transportation industry may 

be increasing from 8 percent to 29 percent, perhaps because 

of recycling of water at individual plants. Knowing the type of 

industrial facilities in a geographic area is important; if withdrawals are increasingly by facilities such as those listed in table 

5, use of a consumptive-use coefficient higher than 10 percent 

might be more representative and appropriate. 

 In 2000, industrial water-use withdrawals in the Great 

Lakes States were 6,380 Mgal/d (fig. 4 and table 3), the third 

largest water-use withdrawal category in the Great Lakes States. 

Estimated industrial consumptive use for 2000 was 640 Mgal/d 

(fig. 5) and was lower than that for public-supply, thermoelectric, or irrigation consumptive use.

Thermoelectric power

Thermoelectric power consumptive-use coefficients differ 

by type of cooling at each facility, age of the facility, water 

availability, and type of fuel used. A facility with a oncethrough cooling system uses water only once in the cooling 

process before returning the water to a surface-water source. 

Once-through cooling requires large amounts of water, but 

evaporation is small (usually less than 3 percent) (Solley and 

others, 1998). A closed-loop or recirculation thermoelectric 

plant uses cooling towers or cooling ponds to recycle water 

repeatedly for condenser and reactor cooling; although water 

withdrawal is less, consumptive use is higher. Facilities that 

combine once-through cooling with cooling towers and cooling 

ponds have consumptive-use coefficients somewhat higher than 

for once-through systems. 

Domestic &

public supply 

Industrial

Thermoelectric

Irrigation

Livestock

Commercial

Mining

0

20

40

60

80

MEDIAN CONSUMPTIVE-USE 

COEFFICIENT, IN PERCENT

WATER-USE CATEGORY

Table 3. Estimated consumptive use for Great Lakes States in 

2000, based on median consumptive-use coefficients (from Shaffer 

and Runkle, 2007).

[The 2000 withdrawals are from Hutson and others (2004, table 2) for the 

Great Lakes States and are rounded to three significant figures. Withdrawals for 

domestic, industrial, thermoelectric power, irrigation, livestock, and mining are 

self-supplied. The median consumptive-use coefficients are from Shaffer and 

Runkle (2007, table 43) for the Great Lakes Basin. Consumptive use is calculated by multiplying the coefficient by withdrawals and dividing by 100 and is 

rounded to two significant figures. Mgal/d, million gallons per day.]

Water-use 

category

2000 withdrawals for 

the Great 

Lakes States 

(Mgal/d)

Median

consumptiveuse coefficients

(percent)

Estimated

consumptive 

use

(Mgal/d)

Public supply 10,200 12 1,200

Self-supplied 

domestic

1,080 12 130

Industrial 6,380 10 640

Thermoelectric power53,700 2 1,100

Irrigation1 960 90 860

Livestock2 235 83 200

Mining3 941 10 94

1 If a more conservative irrigation consumptive-use coefficient of 78 percent 

(Shiklomanov and Rodda, 2003) is used, the estimated consumptive use would 

be 750 Mgal/d.

2 Livestock withdrawals do not include New York and Pennsylvania.

3 Mining withdrawals do not include Illinois, Michigan, New York, and 

Wisconsin.

Figure 3. Median consumptive-use coefficients for the Great 

Lakes Basin, by water-use category (from Shaffer and Runkle, 2007).
Table 4. Median consumptive-use coefficients for six major 

Standard Industrial Classification (SIC) code industrial groups.

[The median consumptive-use coefficient is in percent.]

SIC 

code Industrial group

Median 

consumptive-use

coefficient

20 Food and kindred products 12

26 Paper and allied products 9

28 Chemical and allied products 6

32 Stone, clay, and glass products 12

33 Primary metal industries 8

37 Transportation equipment 8

Public Supply

Domestic

Industrial

Thermoelectric

Irrigation

Livestock

Mining

0

10,000

20,000

30,000

40,000

50,000

WITHDRAWALS, IN MILLION GALLONS PER DAY

WATER-USE CATEGORY

Public Supply

Domestic

Industrial

Thermoelectric

Irrigation

Livestock

Mining

0

400

800

1200

CONSUMPTIVE USE, IN MILLION GALLONS  PER DAY

WATER-USE CATEGORY

Table 5. Industries with a consumptive-use coefficient of (a) 50 

percent and more or (b) 20 percent and more with over 5.5 billion 

gallons of water used in 1983.

[Modified from U.S. Bureau of the Census, 1986]

SIC 

code Industry Coefficient

Industries with a consumptive-use coefficient 

of 50 percent or more

2992 Lubricating oils and greases 50

325 Structural clay products1 50

3293 Gaskets, packing, sealing devices 50

3764 Air and gas compressors 50

3332 Primary lead2 57

3275 Gypsum products (like sheetrock) 59

2435 Hardwood, veneer, and plywood 67

2895 Carbon black3 81

Industries with a consumptive-use coefficient 

of 20 percent or more

2032 Canned specialties 23

2043 Cereal breakfast foods 36

2061 Raw cane sugar 24

2063 Beet sugar 34

2082 Malt beverages 22

2086 Bottled and canned soft drinks 45

2221 Weaving mills, manmade fiber and silk 20

2436 Softwood veneer and plywood 43

249 Misc. wood products1 24

2813 Industrial gases 36

284 Soaps, cleaners, and toilet goods1 40

2873 Nitrogenous fertilizers 36

2874 Phosphatic fertilizers 34

3079 Misc. plastics products 20

3296 Mineral wool 29

3321 Gray iron foundries 27

3351 Copper rolling and drawing 20

3356 Nonferrous rolling and drawing 26

351 Engines and turbines1 35

1

 Industrial group used due to “census masking,” a policy of selected data release 

to protect individual privacy and confidentiality in data collection and analysis.

2

 “Primary lead” is the smelting and refining of lead.

3

 Often used as a pigment and reinforcement in rubber and plastic products.

The Department of Energy reports site-specific facility data 

for thermoelectric plants, including the average annual rate of 

cooling-water withdrawals, the average annual rate of coolingwater discharge, and the average annual rate of cooling-water 

consumption (U.S. Department of Energy, 2004). Analysis of 

this Department of Energy thermoelectric power data can be 

found in a report by Dziegielewski and others (2006).

For the Great Lakes States in 2000, the thermoelectricpower water-use withdrawal category had the largest withdrawals at 53,700 Mgal/d (fig. 4); but because of the low median 

consumptive-use coefficient (2 percent), the estimated consumptive use was 1,100 Mgal/d, a little less than that for public 

supply and only a little more than that for irrigation (fig. 5). 

Figure 4. Withdrawals in 2000 for the Great Lakes States, by 

water-use category (from Hutson and others, 2004).

Figure 5. Estimated consumptive use in 2000 for the Great Lakes 

States, by water-use category (from Hutson and others, 2004; 

Shaffer and Runkle, 2007).
Irrigation

Although three-fourths of the references examined by 

Shaffer and Runkle (2007) for the Great Lakes Basin reported 

irrigation consumptive-use coefficients between 90 and 100 

percent, this range was higher than that estimated for the world, 

which was 65 to 78 percent (Shaffer and Runkle, 2007). 

Irrigation consumptive-use coefficients may vary because 

of differences in irrigation methods, inconsistencies in research 

and data availability, varied ways of defining irrigation consumptive use, and atmospheric factors affecting transpiration 

and evaporation (such as temperature, relative humidity, wind 

and air movement, soil-moisture availability, and plant type). 

For example, estimated consumptive-use coefficients are 30 to 

40 percent for flood irrigation and 90 percent for drip irrigation 

(Cosgrove and others, 2000). 

The amount of irrigation water withdrawn in 2000 for the 

Great Lakes States ranked fifth (960 Mgal/d) out of the seven 

water-use withdrawal categories, but the estimated consumptive 

use ranked third (860 Mgal/d). This irrigation consumptive use 

was estimated using the conventional 90-percent coefficient. If 

a more conservative consumptive-use coefficient of 78 percent 

were used (1995 assessment; Shiklomanov and Rodda, 2003), 

the estimated consumptive use for the Great Lakes States would 

be 750 Mgal/d. Additional research would be needed to refine 

irrigation consumptive-use data and consumptive-use coefficients. 

Livestock

Three-fourths of the references examined by Shaffer and 

Runkle (2007) reported livestock consumptive-use coefficients 

between 80 and 100 percent. However, the documentation for 

these estimates was sparse. Among the seven water-use withdrawal categories, livestock withdrawals were smallest in 2000 

for the Great Lakes States (235 Mgal/d), but estimated livestock 

consumptive use (200 Mgal/d) was larger than domestic or 

mining because livestock had a higher median consumptive-use 

coefficient, at 83 percent. Further research would be needed 

to refine livestock consumptive-use data and consumptive-use 

coefficients.

Mining

For mining water use, the consumptive-use coefficients 

varied widely by the type of mining activity. The commodity 

mined, the method used, and the hydrologic environment are 

factors that determine the consumptive-use coefficients. For 

example, metal-mining consumptive-use coefficients ranged 

from 1 (for lead) to 77 percent (for copper), and nonmetalmining coefficients ranged from 0 (for magnesium) to 100 

percent (for diatomite) (Quan, 1988). Among the seven wateruse withdrawal categories, mining withdrawals were second 

lowest for 2000 for the Great Lakes States (941 Mgal/d), and 

the amount of estimated consumptive use in 2000 was the lowest (94 Mgal/d).

References

Cosgrove, W.J., and Rijsberman, F.R., 2000, The use of water 

today, chap. 2 of World wide vision, making water everybody’s business: World Water Council, p. 4–21, accessed 

April 28, 2006, at http://www.worldwatercouncil.org/

fileadmin/wwc/Library/WWVision/Chapter2.pdf

Dziegielewski, Ben; Bik, Thomas; Usama, Alqalawi; Mubako, 

Stanley; Eidem, Nathan; and Bloom, Shauna, 2006, Water 

use benchmarks for thermoelectric power generation: 

Accessed November 5, 2007, at http://www.geog.siu.edu/

geography_info/research/documents/ThermoReport.pdf

Great Lakes Commission, 2005, Annual reports from the Great 

Lakes Regional Water Use Database Repository, representing 1998 to 2002 water-use data: Ann Arbor, Mich., accessed 

May 31, 2006, at http://www.glc.org/wateruse/database/

downloads.html

Hutson, S.S., Barber, N.L., Kenny, J.F., Linsey, K.S., Lumia, 

D.S., and Maupin, M.A., 2004, Estimated use of water in the 

United States in 2000: U.S. Geological Survey Circular 1268, 

46 p.

Quan, C.K., 1988, Water use in the domestic nonfuel minerals 

industry: U.S. Bureau of Mines Information Circular 9196, 

62 p.

Shaffer, K.H., and Runkle, D.L., 2007, Consumptive water-use 

coefficients for the Great Lakes Basin and climatically similar areas: U.S. Geological Survey Scientific Investigations 

Report 2007–5197, 191 p.

Shiklomanov, I.A., and Rodda, J.C., 2003, World water 

resources at the beginning of the 21st century: Cambridge 

U.K., Cambridge University Press [for] UNESCO, 435 p.

Solley, W.B., Merk, C.F., and Pierce, R.R., 1988, Estimated use 

of water in the United States in 1985: U.S. Geological Survey 

Circular 1004, 82 p.

Solley, W.B., Pierce, R.R., and Perlman, H.A., 1998, Estimated 

use of water in the United States in 1995: U.S. Geological 

Survey Circular 1200, 71 p.

U.S. Bureau of the Census, 1986, 1982 Census of manufactures: 

Washington, D.C., Subject series, Water use in manufacturing, MC82–S–6, 72 p. [Reported data are for 1983.]

U.S. Department of Energy, 2004, Year 2004 annual steam-electric plant operation and design data: Department of Energy 

Form EIA-767 data file, accessed January 5, 2006, at http://

www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/electricity/page/eia767.html

—By Kimberly H. Shaffer