Renewable energy is one way for companies to ensure sustainability. It’s not the only one, however, as reusing water can have a positive effect on the environment too.

PepsiCo has opted to use Siemens (News - Alert) Industry Automation Division’s integrated reuse solution to reduce fresh water consumption. The firm is integrating the solution at its snack food production plant in Santiago, Chile.

With the wastewater treatment plant being upgraded, the production plant is boosting its wastewater treatment capacity by 20 percent with the incorporation of technology that’s beneficial to the environment. The system will reduce fresh water consumption by as much as 70 percent.

The solution will cut the amount of fresh water needed to manufacture snacks such as potato chips. These savings will be achieved by taking water already being used in the production process, removing impurities, and piping the water back into production systems. The reused water will be directed to a number of manufacturing processes.

The move is part of an initiative to standardize water reuse methods across PepsiCo’s South American facilities. In Santiago, most of the wastewater is piped through a starch recovery system and then on to a oil and grease removal treatment. It’s then routed to a Siemens MemPulse membrane bioreactor (MBR) system to separate liquids and solids. This system is monitored remotely by a team at Siemens’ technology center in Waukesha, Wisconsin. After the MBR stage, the water is pretreated before passing through a reverse-osmosis (RO) system and a disinfection process.

The Siemens solution is more advanced than many other wastewater treatment systems, delivering quality water outflow with a smaller carbon footprint.

PepsiCo has embarked on a series of environmental awareness projects over the last few years. Last June, the corporation teamed up with 7-Eleven Handee Marts to promote recycling. In March 2011, meanwhile, the firm revealed it had developed a way to manufacture plastic bottles using plants.