We shed light on this argument andclarify the objectives of both approaches, their strengths andcomplementarities, in the hope that less energy can be investedin debating these approaches and more on applying anddeveloping them further.Both methodologies have the indirect goal to help theirpractitioners preserve water resources, however, the way theyachieve this differs. The LCA methodology aims at quantifyingpotential environmental impacts generated by a human activityon a wide range of environmental issues (climate change,human respiratory impacts, land use, etc.). One of the potentialcauses of impact is water use. LCA therefore includes potentialimpacts from depriving human users and ecosystems of waterresources, as well as specific potential impacts from the emittedcontaminants affecting water, through different environmentalimpact pathways and indicators (mainly eutrophication,acidification and toxicity to human and ecosystems). TheLCA methodology includes four phases: goal and scope,inventory accounting, impact assessment and interpretation.Quantitative impact indicators are at the core of the impactassessment phase.The WFA methodology addresses freshwater resourcesappropriation in a four-step approach including setting goalsand scope, water footprint accounting, sustainability assess-ment, and response formulation. The accounting phaseincludes the quantification and mapping of freshwater usewith three distinct types of water use: the blue, gray and greenwater footprints. WFA is primarily designed to support betterwater management, including its use and allocation and hasplayed an important role in the awareness raising of waterissues in the past decade.Both WFA and LCA use quantitative indicators, but indifferent phases of the assessment. This can be more easilyunderstood when comparing the frameworks of both method-ologies (see Figure 1). WFA particularly relies on water useindicators in the inventory phase, while LCA focuses on impactindicators in the impact phase. This is the primary source ofconfusion for practitioners as indicators are to be understood inthe right context.WFA defines the water footprint (WF) as a spatiotemporallyexplicit indicator of freshwater appropriation in the accountingphase. The “water footprint sustainability assessment” phasefocuses on a multifaceted analysis of the environmentalsustainability, economic efficiency and social equity of fresh-water use and allocation. Here, WFs are put into context, forexample by comparing WFs of activities or products to