Virtual Water Trade Network

Traded Commodity

🔵 Blue 0% 🟢 Green 0% 🟤 Grey 0%

Exporting Region

Annual export volume 120 kt

Flow speed 1.0×

Live Readouts

Virtual water exported / year

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Grey water share (pollution dilution)

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Region Blue Water Scarcity Index

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How it works

Every kilogram of a farmed good embeds the water used to grow, process and dilute waste from it — its water footprint (Hoekstra & Chapagain / Water Footprint Network method), split into three components:

WF_total = WF_blue + WF_green + WF_grey
  blue  = surface + groundwater consumed (irrigation)
  green = rainwater stored in the soil and used by the crop
  grey  = freshwater needed to dilute fertiliser/pesticide runoff
          back to safe concentration

When a region exports a commodity, it exports the water embedded in it — this is virtual water trade. For an export volume V (kilotonnes/year):

Water exported (billion L/yr) = V × 10⁶ kg/kt × WF_per_kg (L/kg) / 10⁹

Because only the blue share draws down a region's actual rivers, lakes and aquifers, sustained exports of a blue-water-intensive good from an already water-stressed region push its Blue Water Scarcity Index (blue water withdrawn ÷ blue water available) higher — the same logic behind real concerns about water-stressed countries exporting thirsty crops like cotton or almonds:

BWSI = baseline withdrawal/availability + (blue water exported ÷ regional availability) × sensitivity

Commodity — sets the blue/green/grey split and the litres-per-kilogram footprint (published global averages).
Exporting region — sets the baseline water stress and how sensitive that region is to extra blue-water withdrawal.
Export volume — scales how many droplet particles leave the source node per second and the live readouts.
Droplets are colour-coded by which component of the footprint (blue/green/grey) they represent, and arc from the exporter to a randomly weighted importer.

Blue water (irrigation) Green water (rainfall) Grey water (dilution)

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