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Located in a typical semi-arid area in China, Zhangye city has been experiencing increasing water shortage during the rapid urbanization process over the past decades. This paper conducted an input output analysis (IOA) and structural decomposition analysis (SDA) to explore the water footprint (WF) of Zhangye city and its driving factors during 2001-2011. Particularly, the urbanization level was incorporated into the SDA to depict the relationship between urbanization and WF. The results showed that the WF of Zhangye city decreased from 1.01 billion m(3) in 2001 to 0.997 billion m(3) in 2011. The principal contributor to the slight reduction of the WF of Zhangye was the technological effect stemmed from the growth on the water consumption intensity and partly offset by the structural effect induced by the change of final demand structure. From the final demand perspective, structural effect as the principle driving factor contributed to the increment of both urban and rural household WFs by 206.3%, 136.3%, while urbanization rate 17.7% and 14.6%, respectively. Meanwhile, the growth of urban and rural household WFs were offset by technological effect and per capita scale effect, respectively. From the sectoral categories scale perspective, agriculture, forestry, animal husbandry, transportation communication and electronic equipment sectors are responsible for the variation of total WF and household WF. Technological innovation and final demand structure adjustment are also suggested to be the priorities for Zhangye to reduce the WF. (C) 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.