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WP#95 Water Usage Impact (WUI) v1 Metric

The Green Grid · The Green Grid DCRE Standing Work Group

WUI relates consumed water to the water stress of the site's location, so the same litre counts for more in a scarce basin.

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Overview

This 2025 paper (no. 95) releases the Water Usage Impact metric from the DCRE framework as a standalone publication. The idea is simple: WUE only states litres per kWh, but the impact of a litre depends on where it is drawn. WUI relates consumed water to the water-stress level of the location, producing a proxy that reflects that difference. The paper exists to separate cases where WUE reads the same in litres per kWh but the impact differs by basin.

Because it pulls out only the water half of the framework, the paper should be read with DCRE (WP 93), which also includes energy and climate zone, while WUI concentrates on the water-to-stress relationship. A WUI scoring calculator is published in the library alongside it, so the metric is not purely conceptual and has a tool for producing a score per site.

The record does not say which source supplies the stress level, what range the scale has or what the coefficients are, and the full text requires sign-in. This page therefore describes the concept and where it fits, and gives no numbers. The related standard is ISO/IEC 30134-9. Results should not underpin a design decision until the calculator's inputs have been verified.

Key points

  1. WUI is a proxy for the environmental impact of consumed water relative to local water stress.
  2. The same litre counts for more in a high-stress basin.
  3. WUI is a sub-component of the DCRE framework, released here on its own.
  4. A WUI scoring calculator accompanies it in the library.
  5. Published 2025 as v1; related standard ISO/IEC 30134-9.

Using it in design

  • Put a water-stress rating beside WUE on the site-selection screen.
  • Show a warning when evaporative cooling is selected at a high-stress site.
  • Do not conflate WUI with DCRE: use WUI when only the water view is needed, DCRE when energy and climate are wanted too.

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Who should read it

Designers weighing water risk while choosing a cooling technology, and site-assessment teams.

Related standards

  • ISO/IEC 30134-9

Publication details

Authors
The Green Grid DCRE Standing Work Group
Publisher
The Green Grid
Year
2025
Document number
WP 95
Document language
English
Source type
Industry body
Access
Citation only
Licence
Copyright retained; citation only — the publisher’s terms apply to the original document

Citation

The Green Grid DCRE Standing Work Group (2025). WP#95 Water Usage Impact (WUI) v1 Metric. The Green Grid. WP 95. https://www.thegreengrid.org/resources/library-and-tools/wp95-water-usage-impact-wui-metric

WaterPerformance metricsSustainabilitySite planning

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